From  a  photograph  of  the  author. 

MARK  TWAIN  (SAMUEL  L.  CLEMENS) 


• 


Innocents  Abroad 

OR 
THE  NEW  PILGRIMS*  PROGRESS 

Being  Some  Account  of  the  Steamship  Quaker  City' s 
Pleasure  Excursion  to  Europe  and  the  Holy  Land. 


BY 

MARK  TWAIN 

(Samuel  L.  ^Clemens) 

VOLUMES  ONE  AND  TWO 
COMPLETE  IN  ONE  VOLUME 


ILLUSTRATED 


NEW     YORK 

GROSSET    &     DUNLAP 

PUBLISHERS 


in  the  United  States  of  America 


REPLACING 


THE  INNOCENTS  ABROAD. 

Copyright,  1869, 1897,  and  1899,  by  THK  AMERICAN  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 

Copyright,  1911,  by  CLARA  GABRILOWITSCH 

Printed  io  the  United  States  of  America 


At 


TO  MY  MOST  PATIENT  READER  AND  MOST 
CHARITABLE  CRITIC,  MY  AGED  MOTHER 
THIS  VOLUME  IS  AFFECTIONATELY  INSCRIBED 


PREFACE 


riS  book  is  a  record  of  a  pleasure  trip.  If  it  were  a 
record  of  a  solemn  scientific  expedition,  it  would  have 
about  it  that  gravity,  that  profundity,  and  that  im 
pressive  incomprehensibility  which  are  so  proper  to  works  of 
that  kind,  and  withal  so  attractive.  Yet  notwithstanding  it  is 
only  a  record  of  a  picnic,  it  has  a  purpose,  which  is,  to  sug 
gest  to  the  reader  how  he  would  be  likely  to  see  Europe  and 
die  East  if  he  looked  at  them  with  his  own  eyes  instead  of  the 
eyes  of  those  who  traveled  in  those  countries  before  him.  I 
make  small  pretense  of  showing  any  one  how  he  ought  to  look 
at  objects  of  interest  beyond  the  sea — other  books  do  that,  and 
therefore,  even  if  I  were  competent  to  do  it,  there  is  no  need. 

I  offer  no  apologies  for  any  departures  from  the  usual  style 
of  travel- writing  that  may  be  charged  against  me — for  I  think 
I  have  seen  with  impartial  eyes,  and  I  am  sure  I  have  written 
at  least  honestly,  whether  wisely  or  not. 

In  this  volume  I  have  used  portions  of  letters  which  I  wrote 
for  the  Daily  Alta  California,  of  San  Francisco,  the  propri 
etors  of  that  journal  having  waived  their  rights  and  given  me 
the  necessary  permission.  I  have  also  inserted  portions  of 
several  letters  written  for  the  New  York  Tribune  and  the  New 
York  Herald. 

THE  AUTHOR. 

SAN  FRANCISCO. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

PREFACE 

I  WE  Go  TO  SEE  KINGS  .        .        .        .       .       .       .        1 

II  OUR    PADDLE-WHEELS    Go    'ROUND    .        .        .        .        8 

III  FINE  DAY  AT   SEA?     "On,  MY!"   .        .        .     ,  .      12 

IV  OUR  SINGING  PROVOKES  HEAD-WINDS       ...      16 
V  THE  WATCH  THAT  COULDN'T  KEEP  UP  ...      23 

VI  THE  POOR.  SHIFTLESS,  LAZY  AZOREANS  ...      29 

VII  GIBRALTAR — A  "Gos"  ON  A  SHINGLE  .        .        .        .35 

VIII  MOROCCO,  WHERE  RICHES  HAVE  STINGS  ...      45 

IX  THE  FRENCHMAN'S  SACRED  CAT-MAT      ...      50 

X  THE  MARSEILLAISES  MISUNDERSTAND  Us  .        .        .55 

XI  THE   MELANCHOLY   CHATEAU  D'!F   .        .                      61 

XII  FRANCE  is  A  BEWITCHING  GARDEN  ....      66 

XIII  NAPOLEON  AND  ABDUL  Aziz  SEE  Us  .        ...      75 

XIV  WE  SHUDDER  AT  THE  CAN-CAN  .        .        ,        .        .83 
XV  DOWN  WITH  THE  DASTARDLY  ABELARD  !  .       ..        .      90 

XVI  VERSAILLES    ENTRANCES     Us     .        .        ,        .        .     100 

XVII  OH,  THE   SUPERB  GENOESE  LADIES!     GENOA — SU 
PERB  BUT  TOMB-LIKE  ...        .        .        .     105 

-XVIII  MILAN  POEM  IN  MARBLE    .        .        ...        .        .     113 

XIX  WHO  GLORIFIES  POOR  MR.  LAURA  ....     120 

XX  COMO?     PSHAW!     SEE    LAKE    TAHOE    .        .        .131 

XXI  LUIGI   TO  THE   RESCUE!    WHOOP!    ....     137 

XXII  GONDOLAS  ARE  WATER-HEARSES  .        .        ...    144 

XXIII  WE  MASTER  THE  OLD  MASTERS  .        .        .       .        .    153 

XXIV  GALILEO'S    PENDULUM   IN   THE   DUOMO   .        .  -     .    164 
XXV  WHY  DON'T  THEY  ROB  THEIR  CHURCHES?  .        .    172 

XXVI  ROME  AND  ST.  PETER'S  OVERWHELM  Us  .       .        .180 

XXVII  RARE  SPORT — GUYING  THE  GUIDES  ....    195 

XXVIII  THE  GOOD-NATURED  BROTHER  OF  SKULLS  .        .        .    205 

XXIX  How  VESUVIUS  is  CLIMBED        .                .        ,        .    213 

XXX  THE  RAGS  AND  RICHES  OF  NAPLES  .       .        .        .218 

XXXI  POMPEII  AND  THE  PROUD  SENTINEL  ....    226 

XXXII  SEEING  ATHENS  BY  STEALTH — AND  MOONLIGHT      .    234 

XXXIII  CONSTANTINOPLE  THE  BEWILDERING  ....    246 

XXXIV  MORALS  AND  WHISKEY  ARE  SCARCE  .  ,    255 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER 

XXXV  IN  SEBASTOPOL  THE  BATTERED  .... 

XXXVI  WHAT    RICHELIEU    AND    ODESSA    DID    FOR    EACH 

OTHER  

XXXVII  WE  VISIT  THE  CZAR  OF  ALL  THE  RUSSIANS 

XXXVIII  SMYRNISTE   GIRLS  ARE   BEAUTIFUL   . 

XXXIX  WHO  TOOK  THE  OYSTERS  UP  THE  HILL?  . 

XL  EPHESUS  :A  WORLD  OF  PRECIOUS  RELICS  . 

XLI  OUR  LUXURIOUS  CAMP  ON  LEBANON  . 

XLII  WE    MEET    NOAH'S    FAMILY 

XLIII  BAALBEC  THE  BEAUTIFUL  AND   MYSTERIOUS   . 

XLIV  I  DRINK  OUT  OF  ANANIAS'S  WELL  . 

XLV  NIMROD'S  TOMB,  AT  JONESBOROUGH  . 

XLVI  BY  AIN  MELLAHAH,  THE  DESOLATE  . 

XLVII  THE  BLANK  VOICE  OF  THE  TURTLE  .        . 

XLVIII  THE  MELANCHOLY  HOLY  LAND  .        .        ,        .        . 

XLIX  WHERE  THE  CRUSADERS   PERISHED  . 

L  WTHERE  THE  HORSES  CRIED  .  .  .  , 

LI  THE  BEDOUINS — TATTERDEMALION  VAGRANTS  . 

LII  JOSEPH'S  TOMB  AND  JACOB'S  WELL  . 

LIII  I  WEEP  AT  ADAM'S  TOMB 

LIV  JERUSALEM — WE  ARE  SURFEITED  WITH   SIGHTS!     . 

LV  WE  Miss  LOT'S  WIFE  ....... 

LVI  WHY  THE  WHALE  THREW  UP  JONAH  .        •. 

LVII  WE    ENDURE    CAIRO    .        .        .        .        . 

LVIII  TORTURED   ON   THE   PYRAMIDS   . 

LIX  SEVEN  DELIGHTFUL  DAYS  IN  SPAIN  .        .        . 

LX  OUR  SMALL  AND  ONLY  MISHAP  .        ... 

A    NEWSPAPER    VALEDICTORY    . 
CONCLUSION  . 


THE  r 

INNOCENTS  ABROAD 


CHAPTER  I 

FOR  months  the  great  Pleasure  Excursion  to  Europe 
and  the  Holy  Land  was  chatted  about  in  the  news 
papers  everywhere  in  America,  and  discussed  at  count 
less  firesides.  It  was  a  novelty  in  the  way  of  excursions — its 
like  had  not  been  thought  of  before,  and  it  compelled  that  in 
terest  which  attractive  novelties  always  command.  It  was  to 
be  a  picnic  on  a  gigantic  scale.  .  (The  participants  in  iOinstead 
of  freighting  an  ungainly  steam  ferry-boat  with  youth  and 
beauty  and  pies  and  doughnuts,  and  paddling  up  some  obscure 
creek  to  disembark  upon  a  grassy  lawn  and  wear  themselves 
out  with  a  long  summer  day's  laborious  frolicking  under  the 
impression  that  it  was  fun,  were  to  sail  away  in  a  great  steam 
ship  with  flags  flying  and  cannon  pealing,  and  (take  a  royal 
holiday  beyond  the  broad  ocean,  in  many  a  strange  clime  and 
in  many  a  land  renowned  in  historyjx  They  were  to  sail  for 
months  over  the  breezy  Atlantic  and  the  sunny  Mediterranean  ; 
they  were  to  scamper  about  the  decks  by  day,  rilling  the  ship 
with  shouts  and  laughter — or  read  novels  and  poetry  in  the 
shade  of  the  smoke-stacks,  or  watch  for  the  jellyfish  and  the 
nautilus,  over  the  side,  and  the  shark,  the  whale,  and  other 
strange  monsters  of  the  deep;  and  at  night  they  were  to  dance 
in  the  open  air,  on  the  upper  deck,  in  the  midst  of  a  ball 
room  that  stretched  from  horizon  to  horizon,  and  was  domed 
by  the  bending  heavens  and  lighted  by  no  meaner  lamps  than 
the  stars  and  the  magnificent  moon— dance,  and  promenade, 
and  smoke,  and  sing,  and  make  love,  and  search  the  skies  for 
constellations  that  never  associated  with  the  "Big  Dipper" 


2  MARK  TWAIN 

they  were  so  tired  of :  and  they  were  to  see  the  ships  of 
twenty  navies — the  customs  and  costumes  of  twenty  curious 
peoples — the  great  cities  of  half  a  world — they  were  to  hob 
nob  with  nobility  and  hold  friendly  converse  with  kings  and 
princes,  Grand  Moguls,  and  the  anointed  lords  of  mighty 
empires ! 

It  was  a  brave  conception;  it  was  the  offspring  of  a  most 
ingenious  brain.  It  was  well  advertised,  but  it  hardly  needed 
it:  bold  originality,  the  extraordinary  character,  the  seductive 
nature,  and  the  vastness  of  the  enterprise  provoked  comment 
everywhere  and  advertised  it  in  every  household  in  the  land. 
Who  could  read  the  program  of  the  excursion  without  long 
ing  to  make  one  of  the  party?  I  will  insert  it  here.  It  is 
almost  as  good  as  a  map.  As  a  text  for  this  book,  nothing 
could  be  better: 

EXCURSION     TO     THE     HOLY     LAND,     EGYPT,     THE 

CRIMEA,    GREECE,    AND    INTERMEDIATE 

POINTS  OF  INTEREST. 

BROOKLYN,  February  1st,  1867. 

The  undersigned  will  make  an  excursion  as  above  during  the  coming 
season,  and  begs  to  submit  to  you  the  following  program: 

A  first-class  steamer,  to  be  under  his  own  command,  and  capable  of  ac 
commodating  at  least  one  hundred  and  fifty  cabin  passengers,  will  be 
selected,  in  which  will  be  taken  a  select  company,  numbering  not  more 
than  three-fourths  of  the  ship's  capacity.  There  is  good  reason  to 
believe  that  this  company  can  be  easily  made  up  in  this  immediate  vicinity, 
of  mutual  friends  and  acquaintances. 

The  steamer  will  be  provided  with  every  necessary  comfort,  includ 
ing  library  and  musical  instruments. 

An  experienced  physician  will  be  on  board. 

Leaving  New  York  about  June  1st,  a  middle  and  pleasant  route 
will  be  taken  across  the  Atlantic,  and,  passing  through  the  group  of 
Azores,  St.  Michael  will  be  reached  in  about  ten  days.  A  day  or  two 
will  be  spent  here,  enjoying  the  fruit  and  wild  scenery  of  these  islands, 
and  the  voyage  continued,  and  Gibraltar  reached  in  three  or  four  days. 

A  day  or  two  will  be  spent  here  in  looking  over  the  wonderful 
subterraneous  fo-tifications,  permission  to  visit  these  galleries  ;;  -ing 
readily  obtained. 

From  Gibraltar,  running  along  the  coasts  of  Spain  and  France, 
Marseilles  will  be  reached  in  three  days.  Here  ample  time  vill  be 
given  not  only  to  look  over  the  city,  which  was  founded  six  hundred 
years  before  the  Christian  era,  and  its  artificial  port,  the  finest  cf 
the  kind  in  the  Mediterranean,  but  to  visit  Paris  during  the  Great 
Exhibition,  and  the  beautiful  city  of  Lyons,  lying  intermediate,  from 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  3 

the  heights  of  which,  on  a  clear  day,  Mont  Blanc  and  the  Alps  can 
be  distinctly  seen.  Passengers  who  may  wish  to  extend  the  time  at 
Paris  can  do  so,  and,  passing  down  through  Switzerland,  rejoin  the 
steamer  at  Genoa. 

From  Marseilles  to  Genoa  is  a  run  of  one  night.  The  excursionists 
will  have  an  opportunity  to  look  over  this,  the  "magnificent  city 
of  palaces,"  and  visit  the  birthplace  of  Columbus,  twelve  miles  off, 
over  a  beautiful  road  built  by  Napoleon  I.  From  this  point,  excursions 
may  be  made  to  Milan,  Lakes  Como  and  Maggiore,  or  to  Milan, 
Verona  (famous  for  its  extraordinary  fortifications),  Padua,  and 
Venice.  Or,  if  passengers  desire  to  visit  Palma  (famous  for  Cor- 
reggio's  frescoes)  and  Bologna,  they  can  by  rail  go  on  to  Florence,  and 
rejoin  the  steamer  at  Leghorn,  thus  spending  about  three  weeks  amid 
the  cities  most  famous  for  art  in  Italy. 

From  Genoa  the  run  to  Leghorn  will  be  made  along  the  coast  in 
one  night,  and  time  appropriated  to  this  point  in  which  to  visit  Florence, 
its  palaces  and  galleries;  Pisa,  its  Cathedral  and  "Leaning  Tower,"  and 
Lucca  and  its  baths  and  Roman  Amphitheater ;  Florence,  the  most 
remote,  being  distant  by  rail  about  sixty  miles. 

From  Leghorn  to  Naples  (calling  at  Civita  Vecchia  to  land  any  who 
may  prefer  to  go  to  Rome  from  that  point)  the  distance  will  be  made 
in  about  thirty-six  hours ;  the  route  will  lay  along  the  coast  of  Italy, 
close  by  Caprera,  Elba,  and  Corsica.  Arrangements  have  been  made 
to  take  on  board  at  Leghorn  a  pilot  for  Caprera,  and,  if  practicable,  a 
call  will  be  made  there  to  visit  the  home  of  Garibaldi. 

Rome  (by  rail),  Herculaneum,  Pompeii,  Vesuvius,  Virgil's  tomb, 
and  possibly,  the  ruins  of  Paestum,  can  be  visited,  as  well  as  the  beauti 
ful  surroundings  of  Naples  and  its  charming  bay. 

The  next  point  of  interest  will  be  Palermo,  the  most  beautiful  city 
of  Sicily,  which  will  be  reached  in  one  night  from  Naples.  A  day  will 
be  spent  here,  and,  leaving  in  the  evening,  the  course  will  be  taken 
toward  Athens. 

Skirting  along  the  north  coast  of  Sicily,  passing  through  the  group 
of  ^Eolian  Isles,  in  sight  of  Stromboli  and  Vulcania,  both  active  vol 
canoes,  through  the  Straits  of  Messina,  with  "Scylla"  on  the  one 
hand  and  "Charybdis"  on  the  other,  along  the  east  coast  of  Sicily,  and 
in  sight  of  Mount  ^Etna,  along  the  south  coast  of  Italy,  the  west  and 
south  coast  of  Greece,  in  sight  of  ancient  Crete,  up  Athens  Gulf,  and 
into  the  Piraeus,  Athens  will  be  reached  in  two  and  a  half  or  three 
days.  After  tarrying  here  awhile,  the  Bay  of  Salamis  will  be  crossed, 
and  a  day  given  to  Corinth,  whence  the  voyage  will  be  continued  to 
Constantinople,  passing  on  the  way  through  the  Grecian  Archipelago, 
the  Dardanelles,  the  Sea  of  Marmora,  and  the  mouth  of  the  Golden 
Horn,  and  arriving  in  about  forty-eight  hours  from  Athens. 

After  leaving  Constantinople,  the  way  will  be  taken  out  through  the 
beautiful  Bosphorus,  across  the  Black  Sea  to  Sebastopol  and  Balaklava, 
a  run  of  about  twenty-four  hours.  Here  it  is  proposed  to  remain  two 
days,  visiting  the  harbors,  fortifications,  and  battle-fields  of  the  Crimea ; 


4  MARK  TWAIN 

thence  back  through  the  Bosphorus,  touching  at  Constantinople  to  take 
in  any  who  may  have  preferred  to  remain  there;  down  through  the 
Sea  of  Marmora  and  the  Dardanelles,  along  the  coasts  of  ancient  Troy 
and  Lydia  in  Asia,  to  Smyrna,  which  will  be  reached  in  two  or  two 
and  a  half  days  from  Constantinople.  A  sufficient  stay  will  be  made 
here  to  give  opportunity  of  visiting  Ephesus,  fifty  miles  distant  by  rail. 

From  Smyrna  toward  the  Holy  Land  the  course  will  lay  through 
the  Grecian  Archipelago,  close  by  the  Isle  of  Patmos,  along  the  coast 
of  Asia,  ancient  Pamphylia,  and  the  Isle  of  Cyprus.  Beirout  will 
be  reached  in  three  days.  At  Beirout  time  will  be  given  to  visit 
Damascus ;  after  which  the  steamer  will  proceed  to  Joppa. 

From  Joppa,  Jerusalem,  the  River  Jordan,  the  Sea  of  Tiberias, 
Nazareth,  Bethany,  Bethlehem,  and  other  points  of  interest  in  the 
Holy  Land  can  be  visited,  and  here  those  who  may  have  preferred  to 
make  the  journey  from  Beirout  through  the  country,  passing  through 
Damascus,  Galilee,  Capernaum,  Samaria,  and  by  the  River  Jordan  and 
Sea  of  Tiberias,  can  rejoin  the  steamer. 

Leaving  Joppa,  the  next  point  of  interest  to  visit  will  be  Alexandria, 
which  will  be  reached  in  twenty-four  hours.  The  ruins  of  Caesar's 
Palace,  Pompey's  Pillar,  Cleopatra's  Needle,  the  Catacombs,  and  ruins 
of  ancient  Alexandria,  will  be  found  worth  the  visit.  The  journey 
to  Cairo,  one  hundred  and  thirty  miles  by  rail,  can  be  made  in  a  few 
hours,  and  from  which  can  be  visited  the  site  of  ancient  Memphis. 
Joseph's  Granaries,  and  the  Pyramids. 

From  Alexandria  the  route  will  be  taken  homeward,  calling  at  Malta, 
Cagliari  (in  Sardinia),  and  Palma  (in  Majorca),  all  magnificent 
harbors,  with  charming  scenery,  and  abounding  in  fruits. 

A  day  or  two  will  be  spent  at  each  place,  and  leaving  Palma  in 
the  evening,  Valencia  in  Spain  will  be  reached  the  next  morning.  A 
few  days  will  be  spent  in  this,  the  finest  city  of  Spain. 

From  Valencia,  the  homeward  course  will  be  continued,  skirting 
along  the  coast  of  Spain.  Alicante,  Carthagena,  Palos,  and  Malaga 
will  be  passed  but  a  mile  or  two  distant,  and  Gibraltar  reached  in  about 
twenty-four  hours. 

A  stay  of  one  day  will  be  made  here,  and  the  voyage  continue^ 
to  Madeira,  which  will  be  reached  in  about  three  days.  Captain 
Marryatt  writes :  "I  do  not  know  a  spot  on  the  globe  which  so  much 
astonishes  and  delights  upon  first  arrival  as  Madeira."  A  stay  of  one 
or  two  days  will  be  made  here,  which,  if  time  permits,  may  be  extended, 
and  passing  on  through  the  islands,  and  probably  in  sight  of  the 
Peak  of  Teneriffe,  a  southern  track  will  be  taken,  and  the  Atlantic 
crossed  within  the  latitudes  of  the  northeast  trade-winds,  where  mild 
and  pleasant  weather  and  a  smooth  sea  can  always  be  expected. 

A  call  will  be  made  at  Bermuda,  which  lies  directly  in  this  route 
homeward,  and  will  be  reached  in  about  ten  days  from  Madeira,  and 
after  spending  a  short  time  with  our  friends  the  Bermudians,  the 
final  departure  will  be  made  for  home,  which  will  be  reached  in  about 
three  days. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  5 

Already,  applications  have  been  received  from  parties  in  Europe 
wishing  to  join  the  Excursion  there. 

The  ship  \viil  at  all  times  be  a  home,  where  the  excursionists,  if 
sick,  will  be  surrounded  by  kind  friends,  and  have  all  possible  comfort 
and  sympathy. 

Should  contagious  sickness  exist  in  any  of  the  ports  named  in 
the  program,  such  ports  will  be  passed,  and  others  of  interest  substituted. 

The  price  of  passage  is  fixed  at  $1,250,  currency,  for  each  adult  pas 
senger.  Choice  of  rooms  and  of  seats  at  the  tables  apportioned  in 
the  order  in  which  passages  are  engaged,  and  no  passage  considered 
engaged  until  ten  per  cent,  of  the  passage  money  is  deposited  with  the 
treasurer. 

Passengers  can  remain  on  board  of  the  steamer  at  all  ports,  if  they 
desire,  without  additional  expense,  and  all  boating  at  the  expense  of 
the  ship. 

All  passages  must  be  paid  for  when  taken,  in  order  that  the  most 
perfect  arrangements  be  made  for  starting  at  the  appointed  time. 

Applications  for  passage  must  be  approved  by  the  committee  before 
tickets  are  issued,  and  can  be  made  to  the  undersigned. 

Articles  of  interest  or  curiosity,  procured  by  the  passengers  during 
the  voyage,  may  be  brought  home  in  the  steamer  free  of  charge. 

Five  dollars  per  day,  in  gold,  it  is  believed,  will  be  a  fair  cal 
culation  to  make  for  all  traveling  expenses  on  shore,  and  at  the  various 
points  where  passengers  may  wish  to  leave  the  steamer  for  days  at  a 
time. 

The  trip  can  be  extended,  and  the  route  changed,  by  unanimous  vote 
of  the  passengers. 

CHAS.  C.  DUNCAN, 
117  WALL  STREET,  NEW  YORK. 
R.  R.  G ,  Treasurer. 

COMMITTEE  ON  APPLICATIONS. 
J.  T.  H ,  ESQ.,  R.  R.  G ,  ESQ.,  C.  C.  DUNCAN. 

COMMITTEE  ON  SELECTING  STEAMER. 

CAPT.   W.   W.    S ,   Surveyor  for  Board   of    Underwriters. 

C.  W.  C ,  Consulting  Engineer  for  U.  S.  and  Canada. 

J.  T.  H ,  ESQ. 

C.  C.  DUNCAN. 

P.  S. — The  very  beautiful  and  substantial  side-wheel  steamship 
Quaker  City  has  been  chartered  for  the  occasion,  and  will  leave  New 
York.  June  8th.  Letters  have  been  issued  by  the  government  commend 
ing  the  party  to  courtesies  abroad. 

What  was  there  lacking  about  that  program,  to  make  it 
irresistible?  Nothing,  that  any  finite  mind  could  discover. 


6  MARK  TWAIN 

Paris,  England,  Scotland,  Switzerland,  Italy — Garibaldi!  The 
Grecian  Archipelago!  Vesuvius!  Constantinople!  Smyrna! 
The  Holy  Land!  Egypt  and  "our  friends  the  Bermudians"! 
People  in  Europe  desiring  to  join  the  excursion — contagious 
sickness  to  be  avoided — boating  at  the  expense  of  the  ship— 
physician  on  board — the  circuit  of  the  globe  to  be  made  if 
the  passengers  unanimously  desired  it — the  company  to  be 
rigidly  selected  by  a  pitiless  "Committee  on  Applications" — 
the  vessel  to  be  as  rigidly  selected  by  as  pitiless  a  "Com 
mittee  on  Selecting  Steamer."  Human  nature  could  not  with 
stand  these  bewildering  temptations.  I  hurried  to  the  trea 
surer's  office  and  deposited  my  ten  per  cent.  I  rejoiced  to 
know  that  a  few  vacant  staterooms  were  still  left.  I  did  avoid 
a  critical  personal  examination  into  my  character,  by  that 
bowelless  committee,  but  I  referred  to  all  the  people  of  high 
standing  I  could  think  of  in  the  community  who  would  be 
least  likely  to  know  anything  about  me. 

Shortly  a  supplementary  program  was  issued  which  set 
forth  that  the  Plymouth  Collection  of  Hymns  would  be  used 
on  board  the  ship.  I  then  paid  the  balance  of  my  passage 
money. 

I  was  provided  with  a  receipt,  and  duly  and  officially  ac 
cepted  as  an  excursionist.  There  was  happiness  in  that,  but 
it  was  tame  compared  to  the  novelty  of  being  "select." 

{^This  supplementary  program  also  instructed  the  excur 
sionists  to  provide  themselves  with  light  musical  instruments 
for  amusement  in  the  ship;  with  saddles  for  Syrian  travel; 
green  spectacles  and  umbrellas ;  veils  for  Egypt ;  and  sub 
stantial  clothing  to  use  in  rough  pilgrimizing  in  the  Holy 
Land.  Furthermore,  it  was  suggested  that  although  the  ship's 
library  would  afford  a  fair  amount  of  reading-matter,  it  would 
still  be  well  if  each  passenger  would  provide  himself  with  a 
few  guide-books,  a  Bible,  and  some  standard  works  of  travel. 
A  list  was  appended,  which  consisted  chiefly  of  books  relat 
ing  to  the  Holy  Land,  since  the  Holy  Lanc^  was  part  of  the 
excursion  and  seemed  to  be  its  main  feature^ 

Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher  was  to  have  accompanied  the 
expedition,  but  urgent  duties  obliged  him  to  give  up  the  idea. 
There  were  other  passengers  who  could  have  been  spared 
better,  and  would  have  been  spared  more  willingly.  Lieu- 
tenant-General  Sherman  was  to  have  been  of  the  party,  also, 
but  the  Indian  war  compelled  his  presence  on  the  plains.  A 
popular  actress  had  entered  her  name  on  the  ship's  books, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  7 

but  something  interfered,  and  she  couldn't  go.  The  "Drum 
mer  Boy  of  the  Potomac"  deserted,  and  lo,  we  had  never  a 
celebrity  left! 

However,  we  were  to  have  a  "battery  of  guns"  from  the 
Navy  Department  (as  per  advertisement),  to  be  used  in  an 
swering  royal  salutes;  and  the  document  furnished  by  the 
Secretary  of  the  Navy,  which  was  to  make  "General  Sher 
man  and  party"  welcome  guests  in  the  courts  and  camps  of 
the  Old  World,  was  still  left  to  us,  though  both  document  and 
battery,  I  think,  were  shorn  of  somewhat  of  their  original 
august  proportions.  However,  had  not  we  the  selected 
program,  still,  with  its  Paris,  its  Constantinople,  Smyrna, 
Jerusalem,  Jericho,  and  "our  friends  the  Bermudians"  ?  What 
did  we  care? 


CHAPTER   II 

OCCASIONALLY,  during  the  following  month,  I 
dropped  in  at  117  Wall  Street  to  inquire  how  the  re 
pairing  and  refurnishing  of  the  vessel  was  coming  on ; 
how  additions  to  the  passenger-list  were  averaging ;  how  many 
people  the  committee  were  decreeing  not  "select,"  every  day, 
and  banishing  in  sorrow  and  tribulation.  I  was  glad  to  know 
that  we  were  to  have  a  little  printing-press  on  board  and 
issue  a  daily  newspaper  of  our  own.  I  was  glad  to  learn  that 
our  piano,  our  parlor  organ,  and  our  melodeon  were  to  be  the 
best  instruments  of  the  kind  that  could  be  had  in  the  market, 
I  was  proud  to  observe  that  among  our  excursionists  were 
three  ministers  of  the  gospel,  eight  doctors,  sixteen  or  eighteen 
ladies,  several  military  and  naval  chieftains  with  sounding 
titles,  an  ample  crop  of  "Professors"  of  various  kinds,  and  a 
gentleman  who  had  "COMMISSIONER  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 
OF  AMERICA  TO  EUROPE,  ASIA,  AND  AFRICA"  thundering  after 
his  name  in  one  awful  blast !  I  had  carefully  prepared  my 
self  to  take  rather  a  back  seat  in  that  ship,  because  of  the  un 
commonly  select  material  that  would  alone  be  permitted  to 
pass  through  the  camel's  eye  of  that  committee  on  credentials ; 
I  had  schooled  myself  to  expect  an  imposing  array  of  mili 
tary  and  naval  heroes,  and  to  have  to  set  that  back  seat  still 
further  back  in  consequence  of  it,  maybe;  but  I  state  frankly 
that  I  was  all  unprepared  for  this  crusher. 

I  fell  under  that  titular  avalanche  a  torn  and  blighted  thing. 
I  said  that  if  that  potentate  must  go  over  in  our  ship,  why, 
I  supposed  he  must — but  that  to  my  thinking,  when  the  United 
States  considered  it  necessary  to  send  a  dignitary  of  that  ton 
nage  across  the  ocean,  it  would  be  in  better  taste,  and  safer, 
to  take  him  apart  and  cart  him  over  in  sections,  in  several  ships. 

Ah,  if  I  had  only  known,  then,  that  he  was  only  a  com 
mon  mortal,  and  that  his  mission  had  nothing  more  overpower 
ing  about  it  than  the  collecting  of  seeds,  and  uncommon  yams 
and  extraordinary  cabbages  and  peculiar  bullfrogs  for  that 
poor,  useless,  innocent,  mildewed  old  fossil,  the  Smithsonian 
Institute,  I  would  have  felt  so  much  relieved. 

8 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  9 

During  that  memorable  month  I  basked  in  the  happiness  of 
being  for  once  in  my  life  drifting  with  the  tide  of  a  great 
popular  movement.  Everybody  was  going  to  Europe — I,  too, 
was  going  to  Europe.  Everybody  was  going  to  the  famous 
Paris  Exposition — I,  too,  was  going  to  the  Paris  Exposition. 
The  steamship  lines  were  carrying  Americans  out  of  the  vari 
ous  ports  of  the  country  at  the  rate  of  four  or  five  thousand 
a  week,  in  the  aggregate.  If  I  met  a  dozen  individuals,  dur 
ing  that  month,  who  were  not  going  to  Europe  shortly,  I  have 
no  distinct  remembrance  of  it  now.  I  walked  about  the  city 
a  good  deal  with  a  young  Mr.  Blucher,  who  was  booked  for 
the  excursion.  He  was  confiding,  good-natured,  unsophisti 
cated,  companionable ;  but  he  was  not  a  man  to  set  the  river  on 
fire.  He  had  the  most  extraordinary  notions  about  this 
European  exodus,  and  came  at  last  to  consider  the  whole 
nation  as  packing  up  for  emigration  to  France.  We  stepped 
'into  a  store  in  Broadway,  one  day,  where  he  bought  a  hand 
kerchief,  and  when  the  man  could  not  make  change,  Mr.  B. 
said: 

("Never  mind,  I'll  hand  it  to  you  in  Paris." 
But  I  am  not  going  to  Paris." 

"How  is — what  did  I  understand  you  to  say?" 

"I  said  I  am  not  going  to  Paris." 

'"Not  going  to  Paris!     Not  g — well  then,  where  in  the  na 
tion  are  you  going  to?" 

"Nowhere  at  all." 

"Not  anywhere  whatsoever? — not  any  place  on  earth  but   ; 
this?" 

"Not  any  place  at  all  but  just  this — stay  here  all  summer." 

My  comrade  took  his  purchase  and  walked  out  of  the  store 
without  a  word — walked  out  with  an  injured  look  upon  his 
countenance.  Up  the  street  apiece  he  broke  silence  and  said 
impressively :  "It  was  a  lie — that  is  my  opinion  of  it !" 

In  the  fullness  of  time  the  ship  was  ready  to  receive  her 
passengers.  I  was  introduced  to  the  young  gentleman  who 
was  to  be  my  room-mate,  and  found  him  to  be  intelligent, 
cheerful  of  spirit,  unselfish,  full  of  generous  impulses,  pa 
tient,  considerate,  and  wonderfully  good-natured.  Not  any 
passenger  that  sailed  in  the  Quaker  City  will  withhold  his  en 
dorsement  of  what  I  have  just  said.  We  selected  a  stateroom 
forward  of  the  wheel,  on  the  starboard  side,  "below  decks." 
It  had  two  berths  in  it,  a  dismal  dead-light,  a  sink  with  a  wash 
bowl  in  it,  and  a  long  sumptuously  cushioned  locker,  which 


10  MARK  TWAIN 

was  to  do  service  as  a  sofa — partly,  and  partly  as  a  hiding- 
place  for  our  things.  Notwithstanding  all  this  furniture,  there 
was  still  room  to  turn  around  in,  but  not  to  swing  a  cat  in,  at 
least  with  entire  security  to  the  cat.  However,  the  room  was 
large,  for  a  ship's  stateroom,  and  was  in  every  way  satisfactory. 

The  vessel  was  appointed  to  sail  on  a  certain  Saturday  early 
in  June. 

A  little  after  noon,  on  that  distinguished  Saturday,  I  reached 
the  ship  and  went  on  board.  All  was  bustle  and  confusion. 
[I  have  seen  that  remark  before,  somewhere.]  The  pier  was 
crowded  with  carriages  and  men;  passengers  were  arriving 
and  hurrying  on  board;  the  vessel's  decks  were  encumbered 
with  trunks  and  valises;  groups  of  excursionists,  arrayed  in 
unattractive  traveling-costumes,  were  moping  about  in  a  driz 
zling  rain  and  looking  as  droopy  and  woebegone  as  so  many 
molting  chickens.  The  gallant  flag  was  up,  but  it  was  under 
the  spell,  too,  and  hung  limp  and  disheartened  by  the  rnast. 
Altogether,  it  was  the  bluest,  bluest  spectacle !  It  was  a  plea 
sure  excursion^ — there  was  no  gainsaying  that,  because  the 
program  said  so — it  was  so  nominated  in  the  bond — but  it 
surely  hadn't  the  general  aspect  of  one. 

Finally,  above  the  banging,  and  rumbling,  and  shouting  and 
hissing  of  steam,  rang  the  order  to  "cast  off!" — a  sudden 
rush  to  the  gangways — a  scampering  ashore  of  visitors — a 
revolution  of  the  wheels,  and  we  were  off — the  picnic  was  be 
gun  !  Two  very  mild  cheers  went  up  from  the  dripping  crowd 
on  the  pier ;  we  answered  them  gently  from  the  slippery  decks ; 
the  flag  made  an  effort  to  wave,  and  failed ;  the  "battery  of 
guns"  spake  not — the  ammunition  was  out. 

We  steamed  down  to  the  foot  of  the  harbor  and  came  to 
anchor.  It  was  still  raining.  And  not  only  raining,  but  storm 
ing.  "Outside"  we  could  see,  ourselves,  that  there  was  a  tre 
mendous  sea  on.  We  must  lie  still,  in  the  calm  harbor,  till  the 
storm  should  abate.  Our  passengers  hailed  from  fifteen  states ; 
only  a  few  of  them  had  ever  been  to  sea  before ;  manifestly  it 
would  not  do  to  pit  them  against  a  full-blown  tempest  until 
they  had  got  their  sea-legs  on.  Toward  evening  the  two  steam- 
tugs  that  had  accompanied  us  with  a  rollicking  champagne  party 
of  young  New-Yorkers  on  board  who  wished  to  bid  farewell 
to  one  of  our  number  in  due  and  ancient  form,  departed,  and 
we  were  alone  on  the  deep.  On  deep  five  fathoms,  an -I  an 
chored  fast  to  the  bottom.  And  out  in  the  solemn  rain,  at 
that.  This  was  pleasuring  with  a  vengeance. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  11 

It  was  an  appropriate  relief  when  the  gong  sounded  for 
prayer-meeting.  The  first  Saturday  night  of  any  other  plea 
sure  excursion  might  have  been  devoted  to  whist  and  dancing; 
but  I  submit  it  to  the  unprejudiced  mind  if  it  would  have  been 
in  good  taste  for  us  to  engage  in  such  frivolities,  consider 
ing  what  we  had  gone  through  and  the  frame  of  mind  we  were 
in.  We  would  have  shone  at  a  wake,  but  not  at  anything  more 
festive. 

However,  there  is  always  a  cheering  influence  about  the 
sea ;  and  in  my  berth,  that  night,  rocked  by  the  measured  swell 
of  the  waves,  and  lulled  by  the  murmur  of  the  distant  surf,  I 
soon  passed  tranquilly  out  of  all  consciousness  of  the  dreary 
experiences  of  the  day  and  damaging  premonitions  of  the 
future. 


CHAPTER  III 

ALL  day  Sunday  at  anchor.  The  storm  had  gone  down 
a  great  deal,  but  the  sea  had  not.  It  was  still  piling 
its  frothy  hills  high  in  air  "outside,"  as  we  could 
plainly  see  with  the  glasses.  We  could  not  properly  begin  a 
pleasure  excursion  on  Sunday;  we  could  not  offer  untried 
stomachs  to  so  pitiless  a  sea  as  that.  We  must  lie  still  till 
Monday.  And  we  did.  But  we  had  repetitions  of  church, 
and  prayer-meetings ;  and  so,  of  course,  we  were  just  as 
eligibly  situated  as  we  could  have  been  anywhere. 

I  was  up  early  that  Sabbath  morning,  and  was  early  to 
breakfast.  I  felt  a  perfectly  natural  desire  to  have  a  good, 
long,  unprejudiced  look  at  the  passengers,  at  a  time  when  they 
should  be  free  from  self-consciousness — which  is  at  break 
fast,  when  such  a  moment  occurs  in  the  lives  of  human  beings 
at  all. 

I  was  greatly  surprised  to  see  so  many  elderly  people — 1 
might  almost  say,  so  many  venerable  people.  A  glance  at  the 
long  lines  of  heads  was  apt  to  make  one  think  it  was  all  gray. 
But  it  was  not.  There  was  a  tolerably  fair  sprinkling  of  young 
folks,  and  another  fair  sprinkling  of  gentlemen  and  ladies 
who  were  non-committal  as  to  age,  being  neither  actually  old 
nor  absolutely  young. 

The  next  morning,  we  weighed  anchor  and  went  to  sea. 
It  was  a  great  happiness  to  get  way,  after  this  dragging,  dis 
piriting  delay.  I  thought  there  never  was  such  gladness  in  the 
air  before,  such  brightness  in  the  sun,  such  beauty  in  the  sea. 
I  was  satisfied  with  the  picnic,  then,  and  with  all  its  belong 
ings.  All  my  malicious  instincts  were  dead  within  me;  and 
as  America  faded  out  of  sight,  I  think  a  spirit  of  charity  rose 
up  in  their  place  that  was  as  boundless,  for  the  time  being,  as 
the  broad  ocean  that  was  heaving  its  billows  about  us.  I 
wished  to  express  my  feelings — I  wished  to  lift  up  my  voice 
and  sing,  but  I  did  not  know  anything  to  sing,  and  so  I  was 
obliged  to  give  up  the  idea.  It  was  no  loss  to  the  ship  though, 
perhaps. 

It  was  breezy  and  pleasant,  but  the  sea  was  still  very  rough, 

12 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD   '  13 

One  could  not  promenade  without  risking  his  neck;  at  one 
moment  the  bowsprit  was  taking  a  deadly  aim  at  the  sun  in 
mid-heaven,  and  at  the  next  it  was  trying  to  harpoon  a  shark 
in  the  bottom  of  the  ocean.  What  a  weird  sensation  it  is  to 
feel  the  stern  of  a  ship  sinking  swiftly  from  under  you  and 
see  the  bow  climbing  high  away  among  the  clouds !  One's 
safest  course,  that  day,  was  to  clasp  a  railing  and  hang  on; 
walking  was  too  precarious  a  pastime. 

By  some  happy  fortune  I  was  not  seasick.  That  was  a  thing 
to  be  proud  of.  I  had  not  always  escaped  before.  If  there  is 
one  thing  in  the  world  that  will  make  a  man  peculiarly  and 
insufferably  self -conceited,  it  is  to  have  his  stomach  behave 
itself,  the  first  day  at  sea,  when  nearly  all  his  comrades  are 
seasick.  Soon,  a  venerable  fossil,  shawled  to  the  chin  and 
bandaged  like  a  mummy,  appeared  at  the  door  of  the  after 
deck-house,  and  the  next  lurch  of  the  ship  shot  him  into  my 
arms.  I  said : 

"Good  morning,  sir.    It  is  a  fine  day." 

He  put  his  hand  on  his  stomach  and  said,  "Oh,  my !"  and 
then  staggered  away  and  fell  over  the  coop  of  a  skylight. 

Presently  another  old  gentleman  was  projected  from  the 
same  door,  with  great  violence.  I  said: 

"Calm  yourself,  sir.  There  is  no  hurry.  It  is  a  fine  day, 
sir." 

He,  also,  put  his  hand  on  his  stomach  and  said  "Oh,  my !" 
and  reeled  away. 

In  a  little  while  another  veteran  was  discharged  abruptly 
from  the  same  door,  clawing  at  the  air  for  a  saving  support. 
I  said: 

"Good  morning,  sir.  It  is  a  fine  day  for  pleasuring.  You 
were  about  to  say — " 

"Oh,  my!" 

I  thought  so.  I  anticipated  him,  anyhow.  I  stayed  there 
and  was  bombarded  with  old  gentlemen  for  an  hour,  per 
haps;  and  all  I  got  out  of  any  of  them  was  "Oh,  my!" 

I  went  away,  then,  in  a  thoughtful  mood.  I  said,  this  is  a 
good  pleasure  excursion.  I  like  it.  The  passengers  are  not 
garrulous,  but  still  they  are  sociable.  I  like  those  old  people, 
but  somehow  they  all  seem  to  have  the  "Oh,  my"  rather  bad. 

I  knew  what  was  the  matter  with  them.  They  were  sea 
sick.  And  I  was  glad  of  it.  We  all  like  to  see  people  seasick 
when  we  are  not  ourselves.  Playing  whist  by  the  cabin  lamps, 
v- pen  it  is  storming  outside,  is  pleasant;  walking  the  quarter- 


14  MARK  TWAIN 

deck  in  the  moonlight  is  pleasant ;  smoking  in  the  breezy  fore- 
top  is  pleasant,  when  one  is  not  afraid  to  go  up  there;  but 
these  are  all  feeble  and  commonplace  compared  with  the  joy 
of  seeing  people  suffering  miseries  of  seasickness. 

I  picked  up  a  good  deal  of  information  during  the  after 
noon.  At  one  time  I  was  climbing  up  the  quarter-deck  when 
the  vessel's  stern  was  in  the  sky;  I  was  smoking  a  cigar  and 
feeling  passably  comfortable.  Somebody  ejaculated : 

"Come,  now,  that  won't  answer.     Read  the  sign  up  there — 

No   SMOKING  ABAFT   THE  WHEEL1." 

It  was  Captain  Duncan,  chief  of  the  expedition.  I  went 
forward,  of  course.  I  saw  a  long  spy-glass  lying  on  a  desk 
in  one  of  the  upper-deck  staterooms  back  of  the  pilot-house, 
and  reached  after  ifc — there  was  a  ship  in  the  distance: 

"Ah,  ah — hands  off !     Come  out  of  that !" 

I  came  out  of  that.  I  said  to  a  deck- sweep — but  in  a  low 
voice : 

"Who  is  that  overgrown  pirate  with  the  whiskers  and  the 
discordant  voice?" 

"It's    Captain    Bursley — executive   officer — sailing-master." 

I  loitered  about  awhile,  and  then,  for  want  of  something 
better  to  do,  fell  to  carving  a  railing  with  my  knife.  Some 
body  said,  in  an  insinuating,  admonitory  voice: 

"Now,  say — my  friend — don't  you  know  any  better  than 
to  be  whittling  the  ship  all  to  pieces  that  way?  You  ought 
to  know  better  than  that." 

I  went  back  and  found  the  deck-sweep: 

"Who  is  that  smooth-faced  animated  outrage  yonder  in  the 
fine  clothes?" 

'That's  Captain  L ,  the  owner  of  the  ship — he's  one  of 

the  main  bosses." 

In  the  course  of  time  I  brought  up  on  the  star-board  side 
of  the  pilot-house,  and  found  a  sextant  lying  on  a  bench.  Now, 
I  said,  they  "take  the  sun"  through  this  thing;  I  should  think 
I  might  see  that  vessel  through  it.  I  had  hardly  got  it  to  my 
eye  when  some  one  touched  me  on  the  shoulder  and  said,  dep- 
recatingly : 

"I'll  have  to  get  you  to  give  that  to  me,  sir.  If  there's  any 
thing  you'd  like  to  know  about  taking  the  sun,  I'd  as  soon 
tell  you  as  not — but  I  don't  like  to  trust  anybody  with  that 
instrument.  If  you  want  any  figuring  done —  Aye-aye,  sir!" 

He  was  gone,  to  answer  a  call  from  the  other  side.  I  sought 
the  deck-sweep : 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  15 

"Who  is  that  spider-legged  gorilla  yonder  with  the  sancti 
monious  countenance  ?" 

"It's  Captain  Jones,  sir — the  chief  mate." 

"Well.  This  goes  clear  away  ahead  of  anything  I  ever 
heard  of  before.  Do  you — now  I  ask  you  as  a  man  and  a 
brother — do  you  think  I  could  venture  to  throw  a  rock  here 
in  any  given  direction  without  hitting  a  captain  of  this  ship?" 

"Well,  sir,  I  don't  know — I  think  likely  you'd  fetch  the 
captain  of  the  watch,  maybe,  because  he's  a-standing  right 
yonder  in  the  way." 

I  went  below — meditating,  and  a  little  down-hearted.  I 
thought,  if  five  cooks  can  spoil  a  broth,  what  may  not  five 
captains  do  with  a  pleasure  excursion. 


CHAPTER  IV 

WE  plowed  along  bravely  for  a  week  or  more,  and 
without  any  conflict  of  jurisdiction  among  the  cap 
tains  worth  mentioning.  The  passengers  soon 
learned  to  accommodate  themselves  to  their  new  circumstances, 
and  life  in  the  ship  became  nearly  as  systematically  monoto 
nous  as  the  routine  of  a  barrack.  I  do  not  mean  that  it  was 
dull,  for  it  was  not  entirely  so  by  any  means — but  there  was 
a  good  deal  of  sameness  about  it.  As  is  always  the  fashion 
at  sea,  the  passengers  shortly  began  to  pick  up  sailor  terms — a 
sign  that  they  were  beginning  to  feel  at  home.  Half  past  six 
was  no  longer  half  past  six  to  these  pilgrims  from  New  Eng 
land,  the  South,  and  the  Mississippi  Valley,  it  was  "seven 
bells";  eight,  twelve,  and  four  o'clock  were  "eight  bells";  the 
captain  did  not  take  the  longitude  at  nine  o'clock,  but  at  "two 
bells."  They  spoke  glibly  of  the  "after  cabin,"  the  "for'rard 
cabin,"  "port  and  starboard,"  and  the  "fo'castle." 

At  seven  bells  the  first  gong  rang ;  at  eight  there  was  break 
fast,  for  such  as  were  not  too  seasick  to  eat  it.  After  that  all 
the  well  people  walked  arm-in-arm  up  and  down  the  long  prome 
nade  deck,  enjoying  the  fine  summer  mornings,  and.  the  sea 
sick  ones  crawled  out  and  propped  themselves  up  in  the  lee 
of  the  paddle-boxes  and  ate  their  dismal  tea  and  toast,  and 
looked  wretched.  From  eleven  o'clock  until  luncheon,  and 
from  luncheon  until  dinner  at  six  in  the  evening,  the  em 
ployments  and  amusements  were  various.  Some  reading- 
was  done ;  and  much  smoking  and  sewing,  though  not  by  the 
same  parties;  there  were  monsters  of  the  deep  to  be  looked 
after  and  wondered  at;  strange  ships  had  to  be  scrutinized 
through  opera-glasses,  and  sage  decisions  arrived  at  concern 
ing  them ;  and  more  than  that,  everybody  took  a  personal  in 
terest  in  seeing  that  the  flag  was  run  up  and  politely  dipped 
three  times  in  response  to  the  salutes  of  those  strangers ;  in 
the  smoking-room  there  were  always  parties  of  gentlemen 
playing  euchre,  draughts,  and  dominoes,  especially  dominoes, 
that  delightfully  harmless  game ;  and  down  on  the  main  deck, 
"for'rard" — for'rard  of  the  chicken-coops  and  the  cattle — we 

16 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  17 

had  what  was  called  "horse-billiards."  Horse-billiards  is  a 
fine  game.  It  affords  good,  active  exercise,  hilarity,  and  con 
suming  excitement.  It  is  a  mixture  of  "hop-scotch"  and 
shuffle-board  played  with  a  crutch.  A  large  hop-scotch  dia 
gram  is  marked  out  on  the  deck  with  chalk,  and  each  com 
partment  numbered.  You  stand  off  three  or  four  steps,  with 
some  broad  wooden  disks  before  you  on  the  deck,  and  these 
you  send  forward  with  a  vigorous  thrust  of  a  long  crutch.  If 
a  disk  stops  on  a  chalk  line,  it  does  not  count  anything.  If 
it  stops  in  division  No.  7,  it  counts  7 ;  in  5,  it  counts  5,  and  so  on. 
The  game  is  100,  and  four  can  play  at  a  time.  That  game 
would  be  very  simple,  played  on  a  stationary  floor,  but  with 
us,  to  play  it  well  required  science.  We  had  to  allow  for  the 
reeling  of  the  ship  to  the  right  or  the  left.  Very  often  one 
made  calculations  for  a  heel  to  the  right  and  the  ship  did  not 
go  that  way.  The  consequence  was  that  that  disk  missed  the 
whole  hop-scotch  plan  a  yard  or  two,  and  then  there  was  hu 
miliation  on  one  side  and  laughter  on  the  other. 

When  it  rained,  the  passengers  had  to  stay  in  the  house,  of 
course — or  at  least  the  cabins — and  amuse  themselves  with 
games,  reading,  looking  out  of  the  windows  at  very  familiar 
billows,  and  talking  gossip. 

By  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening,  dinner  was  about  over ; 
an  hour's  promenade  on  the  upper  deck  followed;  then  the 
gong  sounded  and  a  large  majority  of  the  party  repaired  to 
the  after  cabin  (upper),  a  handsome  saloon  fifty  or  sixty  feet 
long,  for  prayers.  The  unregenerated  called  this  saloon  the 
"Synagogue."  The  devotions  consisted  only  of  two  hymns 
from  the  "Plymouth  Collection,"  and  a  short  prayer  and  seldom 
occupied  more  than  fifteen  minutes.  The  hymns  were  ac 
companied  by  parlor  organ  music  when  the  sea  was  smooth 
enough  to  allow  a  performer  to  sit  at  the  instrument  with 
out  being  lashed  to  his  chair. 

After  prayers  the  Synagogue  shortly  took  the  semblance  of 
a  writing-school.  The  like  of  that  picture  was  never  seen  in  a 
ship  before.  Behind  the  long  dining-tables  on  either  side  of  the 
saloon,  and  scattered  from  one  end  to  the  other  of  the  latter, 
some  twenty  or  thirty  gentlemen  and  ladies  sat  them  down 
under  the  swaying  lamps,  and  for  two  or  three  hours  wrote 
diligently  in  their  journals.  Alas !  that  journals  so  volumi 
nously  begun  should  come  to  so  lame  and  impotent  a  conclu 
sion  as  most  of  them  did !  I  doubt  if  there  is  a  single  pilgrim 
of  all  that  host  but  can  show  a  hundred  fair  pages  of  journal 


18  MARK  TWAIN 

concerning  the  first  twenty  days'  voyaging  in  the  Quaker 
City;  and  I  am  morally  certain  that  not  ten  of  the  party  can 
show  twenty  pages  of  journal  for  the  succeeding  twenty  thou 
sand  miles  of  voyaging !  At  certain  periods  it  becomes  the 
dearest  ambition  of  a  man  to  keep  a  faithful  record  of  his 
performances  in  a  book;  and  he  dashes  at  his  work  with  an 
enthusiasm  that  imposes  on  him  the  notion  that  keeping  a 
journal  is  the  veriest  pastime  in  the  world,  and  the  pleasantest. 
But  if  he  only  lives  twenty-one  days,  he  will  find  out  that  only 
those  rare  natures  that  are  made  up  of  pluck,  endurance,  de 
votion  to  duty  for  duty's  sake,  and  invincible  determination, 
may  hope  to  venture  upon  so  tremendous  an  enterprise  as  the 
keeping  of  a  journal  and  not  sustain  a  shameful  defeat. 

One  of  our  favorite  youths,  Jack,  a  splendid  young  fellow 
with  a  head  full  of  good  sense,  and  a  pair  of  legs  that  were  a 
wonder  to  look  upon  in  the  way  of  length  and  straightness 
and  slimness,  used  to  report  progress  every  morning  in  the 
most  glowing  and  spirited  way,  and  say  : 

"Oh,  I'm  coming  along  bully!"  (he  was  a  little  given  to 
slang,  in  his  happier  moods)  "I  wrote  ten  pages  in  my  journal 
last  night — and  you  know  I  wrote  nine  the  night  before,  and 
twelve  the  night  before  that.  Why,  it's  only  fun !" 

"What  do  you  find  to  put  in  it  Jack?" 

"Oh,  everything.  Latitude  and  longitude,  noon  every  day; 
and  how  many  miles  we  made  last  twenty- four  hours ;  and  all 
the  domino  games  I  beat,  and  horse-billiards;  and  whales  and 
sharks  and  porpoises ;  and  the  text  of  the  sermon,  Sundays 
(because  that'll  tell  at  home,  you  know)  ;  and  the  ships  we 
saluted  and  what  nation  they  were;  and  which  way  the  wind 
was,  and  whether  there  was  a  heavy  sea,  and  what  sail  we 
carried,  though  we  don't  ever  carry  any,  principally,  going 
aginst  a  head  wind  always — wonder  what  is  the  reason  of  that? 
— and  how  many  lies  Moult  has  told — Oh,  everything!  I've 
got  everything  down.  My  father  told  me  to  keep  that  journal. 
Father  wouldn't  take  a  thousand  dollars  for  it  when  I  get  it 
done." 

"No,  Jack;  it  will  be  worth  more  than  a  thousand  dollars — 
when  you  get  it  done." 

"Do  you  ? — no,  but  do  you  think  it  will,  though  ?" 

"Yes,  it  will  be  worth  at  least  as  much  as  a  thousand  dol 
lars — when  you  get  it  done.  Maybe,  more." 

"Well,  I  about  half  think  so,  myself.  It  ain't  no  slouch  of 
a  journal." 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  19 

But  it  shortly  became  a  most  lamentable  "slouch  of  a 
journal."  One  night  in  Paris,  after  a  hard  day's  toil  in  sight 
seeing,  I  said : 

"Now  I'll  go  and  stroll  around  the  cafes  awhile,  Jack,  and 
give  you  a  chance  to  write  up  your  journal,  old  fellow." 

His  countenance  lost  its  fire.     He  said: 

"Well,  no,  you  needn't  mind.  I  think  I  won't  run  that  jour 
nal  any  more.  It  is  awful  tedious.  Do  you  know — I  reckon 
I'm  as  much  as  four  thousand  pages  behindhand.  I  haven't  got 
any  France  in  it  at  all.  First  I  thought  I'd  leave  France  out 
and  start  fresh.  But  that  wouldn't  do,  would  it?  The  gov 
ernor  would  say,  'Hello,  here — didn't  see  anything  in  France?' 
That  cat  wouldn't  fight,  you  know.  First  I  thought  I'd  copy 
France  out  of  the  guide-book,  like  old  Badger  in  the  for'rard 
cabin  who's  writing  a  book,  but  there's  more  than  three  hun 
dred  pages  of  it.  Oh,  /  don't  think  a  journal's  any  use — do 
you?  They're  only  a  bother,  ain't  they?" 

"Yes,  a  journal  that  is  incomplete  isn't  of  much  use,  but  a 
journal  properly  kept  is  worth  a  thousand  dollars, — when 
you've  got  it  done." 

"A  thousand ! — well,  I  should  think  so.  /  wouldn't  finish 
it  for  a  million." 

His  experience  was  only  the  experience  of  the  majority  of 
that  industrious  night  school  in  the  cabin.  If  you  wish  to  in 
flict  a  heartless  and  malignant  punishment  upon  a  young  per 
son,  pledge  him  to  keep  a  journal  a  year. 

A  good  many  expedients  were  resorted  to  to  keep  the  ex 
cursionists  amused  and  satisfied.  A  club  was  formed,  of  all 
the  passengers,  which  met  in  the  writing-school  after  prayers 
and  read  aloud  about  the  countries  we  were  approaching,  and 
discussed  the  information  so  obtained. 

Several  times  the  photographer  of  the  expedition  brought 
out  his  transparent  pictures  and  gave  us  a  handsome  magic- 
lantern  exhibition.  His  views  were  nearly  all  of  foreign  scenes, 
but  there  were  one  or  two  home  pictures  among  them.  He 
advertised  that  he  would  "open  his  performance  in  the  after 
cabin  at  'two  bells'  [9  p.m.],  and  show  the  passengers  where 
they  shall  eventually  arrive" — which  was  all  very  well,  but  by 
a  funny  accident  the  first  picture  that  flamed  out  upon  the 
canvas  was  a  view  of  Greenwood  Cemetery. 

On  several  starlight  nights  we  danced  on  the  upper  deck, 
under  the  awnings,  and  made  something  of  a  ballroom  display 
of  brilliancy  by  hanging  a  number  of  ship's  lanterns  to  the 


20  MARK  TWAIN 

stanchions.  Our  music  consisted  of  the  well-mixed  strains  of 
a  melodeon  which  was  a  little  asthmatic  and  apt  to  catch  its 
breath  where  it  ought  to  come  out  strong ;  a  clarinet  which 
was  a  little  unreliable  on  the  high  keys  and  rather  melancholy 
on  the  low  ones ;  and  a  disreputable  accordion  that  had  a  leak 
somewhere  and  breathed  louder  than  it  squawked — a  more 
elegant  term  does  not  occur  to  me  just  now.  However,  the 
dancing  was  infinitely  worse  than  the  music.  When  the  ship 
rolled  to  starboard  the  whole  platoon  of  dancers  came  charg 
ing  down  to  starboard  with  it,  and  brought  up  in  mass  at  the 
rail ;  and  when  it  rolled  to  port,  they  went  floundering  down  to 
port  with  the  same  unanimity  of  sentiment.  Waltzers  spun 
around  precariously  for  a  matter  of  fifteen  seconds  and  then 
went  scurrying  down  to  the  rail  as  if  they  meant  to  go  over 
board.  The  Virginia  reel,  as  performed  on  board  the  Quaker 
City,  had  more  genuine  reel  about  it  than  any  reel  I  ever  saw 
before,  and  was  as  full  of  interest  to  the  spectator  as  it  was 
full  of  desperate  chances  and  hair-breadth  escapes  to  the  par 
ticipant.  We  gave  up  dancing,  finally. 

We  celebrated  a  lady's  birthday  anniversary,  with  toasts, 
speeches,  a  poem,  and  so  forth.  We  also  had  a  mock  trial. 
No  ship  ever  went  to  sea  that  hadn't  a  mock  trial  on  board. 
The  purser  was  accused  of  stealing  an  overcoat  from  state 
room  No.  10.  A  judge  was  appointed;  also  clerks,  a  crier  of 
the  court,  constables,  sheriffs ;  counsel  for  the  state  and  for 
the  defendant;  witnesses  were  subpoenaed,  and  a  jury  em 
paneled  after  much  challenging.  The  witnesses  were  stupid 
and  unreliable  and  contradictory,  as  witnesses  always  are.  The 
counsel  were  eloquent,  argumentative,  and  vindictively  abusive 
of  each  other,  as  was  characteristic  and  proper.  The  case  WHS 
at  last  submitted,  and  duly  finished  by  the  judge  with  an  absurd 
decision  and  a  ridiculous  sentence. 

The  acting  of  charades  was  tried,  on  several  evenings,  by  the 
young  gentlemen  and  ladies,  in  the  cabins,  and  proved  the  most 
distinguished  success  of  all  the  amusement  experiments. 

An  attempt  was  made  to  organize  a  debating  club,  but  it 
was  a  failure.  There  was  no  oratorical  talent  in  the  ship. 

We  all  enjoyed  ourselves — I  think  I  can  safely  say  that, 
but  it  was  in  a  rather  quiet  way.  We  very,  very  seldom  played 
the  piano ;  we  played  the  flute  and  the  clarinet  together,  and 
made  good  music,  too,  what  there  was  of  it,  but  we  always 
played  the  same  old  tune ;  it  was  a  very  pretty  tune — how  well 
I  remember  it — I  wonder  when  I  shall  ever  get  rid  of  it.  We 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  21 

never  played  either  the  melodeon  or  the  organ,  except  at  devo 
tions — but  I  am  too  fast ;  young  Albert  did  know  part  of  a  tune 
— something  about  "O  Something-or-Other  How  Sweet  it 
is  to  Know  that  he's  his  What's-his-Name"  (I  do  not  remember 
the  exact  title  of  it,  but  it  was  very  plaintive,  and  full  of  senti 
ment)  ;  Albert  played  that  pretty  much  all  the  time,  until  we 
contracted  with  him  to  restrain  himself.  But  nobody  ever 
sang  by  moonlight  on  the  upper  deck,  and  the  congregational 
singing  at  church  and  prayers  was  not  of  a  superior  order  of 
architecture.  I  put  up  with  it  as  long  as  I  could,  and  then 
joined  in  and  tried  to  improve  it,  but  this  encouraged  young 
George  to  join  in,  too,  and  that  made  a  failure  of  it;  because 
George's  voice  was  just  "turning,"  and  when  he  was  singing 
a  dismal  sort  of  bass,  it  was  apt  to  fly  off  the  handle  and  startle 
everybody  with  a  most  discordant  cackle  on  the  upper  notes. 
George  didn't  know  the  tunes,  either,  which  was  also  a  draw 
back  to  his  performances.  I  said : 

"'Come,  now,  George,  don't  improvise.  It  looks  too  egotisti 
cal.  It  will  provoke  remark.  Just  stick  to  'Coronation/  like 
the  others.  It  is  a  good  tune — you  can't  improve  it  any,  just 
offhand,  in  this  way." 

"Why,  I'm  not  trying  to  improve  it — and  I  am  singing  like 
the  others — just  as  it  is  in  the  notes." 

And  he  honestly  thought  he  was,  too ;  and  so  he  had  no  one 
to  blame  but  himself  when  his  voice  caught  on  the  center  oc 
casionally,  and  gave  him  the  lockjaw. 

There  were  those  among  the  unregenerated  who  attributed 
the  unceasing  head-winds  to  our  distressing  choir  music.  There 
were  those  who  said  openly  that  it  was  taking  chances  enough 
to  have  such  ghastly  music  going  on,  even  when  it  was  at  its 
best;  and  that  to  exaggerate  the  crime  by  letting  George  help, 
was  simply  flying  in  the  face  of  Providence.  These  said  that 
the  choir  would  keep  up  their  lacerating  attempts  at  melody 
until  they  would  bring  down  a  storm  some  day  that  would 
sink  the  ship. 

There  were  even  grumblers  at  the  prayers.  The  executive 
officer  said  the  Pilgrims  had  no  charity. 

"There  they  are,  down  there  every  night  at  eight  bells,  pray 
ing  for  fair  winds — when  they  know  as  well  as  I  do  that  this  is 
the  only  ship  going  east  this  time  of  the  year,  but  there's  a 
thousand  coming  west — what's  a  fair  wind  for  us  is  a  head 
wind  to  them — the  Almighty's  blowing  a  fair  wind  for  a 


22  MARK  TWAIN 

thousand  vessels,  and  this  tribe  wants  him  to  turn  it  clear 
around  so  as  to  accommodate  one, — and  she  a  steamship  at  that ! 
It  ain't  good  sense,  it  ain't  good  reason,  it  ain't  good  Christi 
anity,  it  ain't  common  human  charity.  Avast  with  such 
nonsense !" 


CHAPTER  V 

f  I  MAKING  it  "by  and  large,"  as  the  sailors  say,  we  had  a 
pleasant  ten  days'  run  from  New  York  to  the  Azores 
islands — not  a  fast  run,  for  the  distance  is  only  twenty- 
four  hundred  miles — but  a  right  pleasant  one,  in  the  main. 
True,  we  had  head-winds  all  the  time,  and  several  stormy  ex 
periences  which  sent  fifty  per  cent,  of  the  passengers  to  bed 
sick,  and  made  the  ship  look  dismal  and  deserted — stormy  ex 
periences  that  all  will  remember  who  weathered  them  on  the 
tumbling  deck,  and  caught  the  vast  sheets  of  spray  that  every 
now  and  then  sprang  high  in  air  from  the  weather  bow  and 
swept  the  ship  like  a  thunder-shower;  but  for  the  most  part 
we  had  balmy  summer  weather,  and  nights  that  were  even  finer 
than  the  days.  We  had  the  phenomenon  of  a  full  moon  located 
just  in  the  same  spot  in  the  heavens  at  the  same  hour  every 
night.  The  reason  of  this  singular  conduct  on  the  part  of  the 
moon  did  not  occur  to  us  at  first,  but  it  did  afterward  when  we 
reflected  that  we  were  gaining  about  twenty  minutes  every  day, 
beause  we  were  going  east  so  fast — we  gained  just  enough 
every  day  to  keep  along  with  the  moon.  It  was  becoming  an 
old  moon  to  the  friends  we  had  left  behind  us,  but  to  us 
Joshuas  it  stood  still  in  the  same  place,  and  remained  always 
the  same. 

Young  Mr.  Blucher,  who  is  from  the  Far  West,  and  is  on 
\  his  first  voyage,  was  a  good  deal  worried  by  the  constantly 
changing  "ship  time."  He  was  proud  of  his  new  watch  at 
first,  and  used  to  drag  it  out  promptly  when  eight  bells  struck 
at  noon,  but  he  came  to  look  after  a  while  as  if  he  were  losing 
confidence  in  it.  Seven  days  out  from  New  York  he  came  on 
deck,  and  said  with  great  decision: 

"This  thing's  a  swindle  !" 

"What's  a  swindle?" 

"Why,  this  watch.  I  bought  her  out  in  Illinois — gave  $150 
for  her — and  I  thought  she  was  good.  And,  by  George,  she 
is  good  on  shore,  but  somehow  she  don't  keep  up  her  lick  here 

23 


24  MARK  TWAIN 

on  the  water — gets  seasick,  maybe.  She  skips ;  she  runs  along 
regular  enough  till  half-past  eleven,  and  then,  all  of  a  sudden, 
she  lets  down.  I've  set  that  old  regulator  up  faster  and  faster, 
till  I've  shoved  it  clear  around,  but  it  don't  do  any  good ;  she 
just  distances  every  watch  in  the  ship,  and  clatters  along  in  a 
way  that's  astonishing  till  it  is  noon,  but  them  eight  bells  always 
gets  in  about  ten  minutes  ahead  of  her,  anyway.  I  don't  know 
what  to  do  with  her  now.  She's  doing  all  she  can — she's  going 
her  best  gait,  but  it  won't  save  her.  Now,  don't  you  know, 
there  ain't  a  watch  in  the  ship  that's  making  better  time  than 
she  is;  but  what  does  it  signify?  When  you  hear  them  eight 
bells  you'll  find  her  just  about  ten  minutes  short  of  her  score, 
sure/' 

The  ship  was  gaining  a  full  hour  every  three  days,  and  this 
fellow  was  trying  to  make  his  watch  go  fast  enough  to  keep 
up  to  her.  But,  as  he  had  said,  he  had  pushed  the  regulator 
up  as  far  as  it  would  go,  and  the  watch  was  "on  its  best  gait," 
and  so  nothing  was  left  him  but  to  fold  his  hands  and  see  the 
ship  beat  the  race.  We  sent  him  to  the  captain,  and  he  ex 
plained  to  him  the  mystery  of  "ship  time,"  and  set  his  troubled 
mind  at  rest.  This  young  man  asked  a  great  many  questions 
about  seasickness  before  we  left,  and  wanted  to  know  what 
its  characteristics  were,  and  how  he  was  to  tell  when  he  had  it. 
He  found  out. 

We  saw  the  usual  sharks,  blackfish,  porpoises,  etc.,  of  course, 
and  by  and  by  large  schools  of  Portuguese  men-of-war  were 
added  to  the  regular  list  of  sea-wonders.  Some  of  them  were 
white  and  some  of  a  brilliant  carmine  color.  The  nautilus  is 
nothing  but  a  transparent  web  of  jelly,  that  spreads  itself  to 
catch  the  wind,  and  has  fleshy-looking  strings  a  foot  or  two 
long  dangling  from  it  to  keep  it  steady  in  the  water.  It  is  an 
accomplished  sailor,  and  has  good  sailor  judgment.  It  reefs 
its  sail  when  a  storm  threatens  or  the  wind  blows  pretty  hard, 
and  furls  it  entirely  and  goes  down  when  a  gale  blows.  Ordi 
narily  it  keeps  its  sail  wet  and  in  good  sailing  order  by  turning 
over  and  dipping  it  in  the  water  for  a  moment.  Seamen  say 
the  nautilus  is  only  found  in  these  waters  between  the  35th  and 
45th  parallels  of  latitude. 

At  three  o'clock  on  the  morning  of  the  21  st  of  June  we  were 
awakened  and  notified  that  the  Azores  islands  were  in  sight. 
I  said  I  did  not  take  any.  interest  in  islands  at  three  o'clock  in 
the  morning.  But  another  persecutor  came,  and  then  another 
and  another,  and  finally  believing  that  the  general  enthusiasm 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  25 

would  permit  no  one  to  slumber  in  peace,  I  got  up  and  went 
sleepily  on  deck.  It  was  five  and  a  half  o'clock  now,  and  a  raw, 
blustering  morning.  The  passengers  were  huddled  about  the 
smoke-stacks  and  fortified  behind  ventilators,  and  all  were 
wrapped  in  wintry  costumes,  and  looking  sleepy  and  unhappy 
in  the  pitiless  gale  and  the  drenching  spray. 

The  island  in  sight  was  Flores.  It  seemed  only  a  mountain 
of  mud  standing  up  out  of  the  dull  mists  of  the  sea.  But  as  we 
bore  down  upon  it,  the  sun  came  out  and  made  it  a  beautiful 
picture — a  mass  of  green  farms  and  meadows  that  swelled  up 
to  a  height  of  fifteen  hundred  feet,  and  mingled  its  upper  out 
lines  with  the  clouds.  It  was  ribbed  with  sharp,  steep  ridges, 
and  cloven  with  narrow  canons,  and  here  and  there  on  the 
heights,  rocky  upheavals  shaped  themselves  into  mimic  battle 
ments  and  castles ;  and  out  of  rifted  clouds  came  broad  shafts 
of  sunlight,  that  painted  summit  and  slope  and  glen  with  bands 
of  fire,  and  left  belts  of  somber  shade  between.  It  was  the 
aurora  borealis  of  the  frozen  pole  exiled  to  a  summer  land ! 

We  skirted  around  two-thirds  of  the  island,  four  miles  from 
shore,  and  all  the  opera-glasses  in  the  ship  were  called  into 
requisition  to  settle  disputes  as  to  whether  mossy  spots  on  the 
uplands  were  groves  of  trees  or  groves  of  weeds,  or  whether 
the  white  villages  down  by  the  sea  were  really  villages  or  only 
the  clustering  tombstones  of  cemeteries.  Finally,  we  stood  to 
sea  and  bore  away  for  San  Miguel,  and  Flores  shortly  became 
a  dome  of  mud  again,  and  sank  down  among  the  mists  and 
disappeared.  But  to  many  a  seasick  passenger  it  was  good 
to  see  the  green  hills  again,  and  all  were  more  cheerful  after 
this  episode  than  anybody  could  have  expected  them  to  be, 
considering  how  sinfully  early  they  had  gotten  up. 
/-"  But  we  had  to  change  our  purpose  about  San  Miguel,  for 
/'a  storm  came  up  about  noon  that  so  tossed  and  pitched  the 
I  vessel  that  common  sense  dictated  a  run  for  shelter.  Therefore 
we  steered  for  the  nearest  island  of  the  group — Fayal  (the 
people  there  pronounce  it  Fy-all,  and  put  the  accent  on  the  first 
syllable).  We  anchored  in  the  open  roadstead  of  Horta,  half 
a  mile  from  the  shore.  The  town  has  eight  thousand  to  ten 
thousand  inhabitants.  Its  snow-white  houses  nestle  cozily  in 
a  sea  of  fresh  green  vegetation,  and  no  village  could  look 
prettier  or  more  attractive.  It  sits  in  the  lap  of  an  amphi 
theater  of  hills  which  are  three  hundred  to  seven  hundred  feet 
high,  and  carefully  cultivated  clear  to  their  summits — not  a 
foot  of  soil  left  idle.  Every  farm  and  every  acre  is  cut  up 


26  MARK  TWAIN 

into  little  square  inclosures  by  stone  walls,  whose  duty  it  is 
to  protect  the  growing  products  from  the  destructive  gales 
that  blow  there.  These  hundreds  of  green  squares,  marked  by 
their  black  lava  walls,  make  the  hills  look  like  vast  checker 
boards. 

The  islands  belong  to  Portugal,  and  everything  in  Fayal  has 
Portuguese  characteristics  about  it.  But  more  of  that  anon. 
A  swarm  of  swarthy,  noisy,  lying,  shoulder-shrugging,  gesticu 
lating,  Portuguese  boatmen,  with  brass  rings  in  their  ears,  and 
fraud  in  their  hearts,  climbed  the  ship's  sides,  and  various 
parties  of  us  contracted  with  them  to  take  us  ashore  at  so  much 
a  head,  silver  coin  of  any  country.  We  landed  under  the  walls 
of  a  little  fort,  armed  with  batteries  of  twelve  and  thirty-two 
pounders,  which  Horta  considered  a  most  formidable  institu 
tion,  but  if  we  were  ever  to  get  after  it  with  one  of  our  turreted 
monitors,  they  would  have  to  move  it  out  in  the  country  if 
they  wanted  it  where  they  could  go  and  find  it  again  when  they 
needed  it.  The  group  on  the  pier  was  a  rusty  one — men  and 
women,  and  boys  and  girls,  all  ragged  and  barefoot,  uncombed 
and  unclean,  and  by  instinct,  education,  and  profession,  beggars. 
They  trooped  after  us,  and  never  more,  v/hile  we  tarried  in 
Fayal,  did  we  get  rid  of  them.  We  walked  up  the  middle  of 
the  principal  street,  and  these  vermin  surrounded  us  on  ail 
sides,  and  glared  upon  us;  and  every  moment  excited  couples 
shot  ahead  of  the  procession  to  get  a  good  look  back,  just  as 
village  boys  do  when  they  accompany  the  elephant  on  his 
advertising  trip  from  street  to  street.  It  was  very  flattering 
to  me  to  be  part  of  the  material  for  such  a  sensation.  Here 
and  there  in  the  doorways  we  saw  women,  with  fashionable. 
Portuguese  hoods  on.  This  hood  is  of  thick  blue  cloth,  at 
tached  to  a  cloak  of  the  same  stuff,  and  is  a  marvel  of  ugliness, 
It  stands  up  high,  and  spreads  far  abroad,  and  is  unfathomably 
deep.  It  fits  like  a  circus  tent,  and  a  woman's  head  is  hidden 
away  in  it  like  the  man's  who  prompts  the  singers  from  his 
tin  shed  in  the  stage  of  an  opera.  There  is  no  particle  of  trim 
ming  about  this  monstrous  capote,  as  they  call  it — it  is  just  a 
plain,  ugly  dead-blue  mass  of  sail,  and  a  wToman  can't  go  within 
eight  points  of  the  wind  with  one  of  them  on;  she  has  to  go 
before  the  wind  or  not  at  all.  The  general  style  of  the  capote 
is  the  same  in  all  the  islands,  and  will  remain  so  for  the  next  ten 
thousand  years,  but  each-  island  shapes  its  capotes  just  enough 
differently  from  the  others  to  enable  an  observer  to  tell  at 
a  glance  what  particular  island  a  lady  hails  from. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  27 

The  Portuguese  pennies  or  re  is  (pronounced  rays)  are 
prodigious.  It  takes  one  thousand  reis  to  make  a  dollar,  and  all 
financial  estimates  are  made  in  reis.  We  did  not  know  this 
until  after  we  had  found  it  out  through  Blucher.  Blucher  said 
he  was  so  happy  and  so  grateful  to  be  on  solid  land  once  more, 
that  he  wanted  to  give  a  feast — said  he  had  heard  it  was  a  cheap 
land,  and  he  was  bound  to  have  a  grand  banquet.  He  invited 
nine  of  us,  and  we  ate  an  excellent  dinner  at  the  principal  hotel. 
In  the  midst  of  the  jollity  produced  by  good  cigars,  good  wine, 
and  passable  anecdotes,  the  landlord  presented  his  bill.  Blucher 
gianced  at  it  and  his  countenance  fell.  He  took  another  look 
to  assure  himself  that  his  sense  had  not  deceived  him,  and  then 
read  the  items  aloud,  in  a  faltering  voice,  while  the  roses  in  his 
cheeks  turned  to  ashes : 

"  Ten  dinners,  at  600  reis,  6,000  reis !'  Ruin  and  desolation !" 

"  'Twenty-five  cigars,  at  100  reis,  2,500  reis !'  Oh,  my  sainted 
mother !" 

"'Eleven  bottles  of  wine,  at  1,200  reis,  13,200  reis'/  Be 
with  us  all !" 

"  'TOTAL,  TWENTY-ONE  THOUSAND  SEVEN  HUNDRED  REIS  !' 
The  suffering  Moses ! — there  ain't  money  enough  in  the  ship 
to  pay  that  bill!  Go — leave  me  to  my  misery,  boys,  I  am  a 
ruined  community." 

I  think  it  was  the  blankest-looking  party  I  ever  saw.  Nobody 
could  say  a  word.  It  was  as  if  every  soul  had  been  stricken 
dumb.  Wine  glasses  descended  slowly  to  the  table,  their  con 
tents  untasted.  Cigars  dropped  unnoticed  from  nerveless 
fingers.  Each  man  sought  his  neighbor's  eye,  but  found  in 
it  no  ray  of  hope,  no  encouragement.  At  last  the  fearful  silence 
was  broken.  The  shadow  of  a  desperate  resolve  settled  upon 
Blucher's  countenance  like'  a  cloud,  and  he  rose  up  and  said : 

"Landlord,  this  is  a  low,  mean  swindle,  and  I'll  never,  never 
stand  it.  Here's  a  hundred  and  fifty  dollars,  sir,  and  it's  all 
you'll  get — I'll  swim  in  blood  before  I'll  pay  a  cent  more." 

Our  spirits  rose  and  the  landlord's  fell — at  least  we  thought 
so;  he  was  confused  at  any  rate,  notwithstanding  he  had  not 
understood  a  word  that  had  been  said.  He  glanced  from  the 
little  pile  of  gold  pieces  to  Blucher  several  times,  and  then  went 
out.  He  must  have  visited  an  American,  for,  when  he  returned, 
he  brought  back  his  bill  translated  into  a  language  that  a 
Christian  could  understand — thus : 


28  MARK  TWAIN 

10  dinners,    6,000    reis,    or        .        .,  .  .        .    $6.00 
25  cigars,  2,500  reis,  or        .        .  .  ,        .      2.50 

11  bottles    wine,    13,200    reis,    or        .  .  .    13.20 
Total  21,700   reis,   or        .        .        *  .  .       ."pUTO 

Happiness   reigned   once   more   in    Blucher's   dinner-party. 
More  refreshments  were  ordered. 


CHAPTER  VI 

I  THINK  the  Azores  must  be  very  little  known  in  America. 
Out  of  our  whole  ship's  company  there  was  not  a  solitary 
individual  who  knew  anything  whatever  about  them.   Some 
of  the  party,  well  read  concerning  most  other  lands,  had  no 
other  information  about  the  Azores  than  that  they  were  a  group 
of  nine  or  ten  small  islands  far  out  in  the  Atlantic,  something 
more  than  half-way  between  New  York  and  Gibraltar.     That 
was  all.    These  considerations  move  me  to  put  in  a  paragraph 
of  dry  facts  just  here. 

The  community  is  eminently  Portuguese — that  is  to  say, 
it  is  slow,  poor,  shiftless,  sleepy,  and  lazy.  There  is  a  civil 
governor,  appointed  by  the  King  of  Portugal;  and  also  a 
military  governor,  who  can  assume  supreme  control  and  suspend 
the  civil  government  at  his  pleasure.  The  islands  contain  a 
population  of  about  200,000,  almost  entirely  Portuguese.  Every 
thing  is  staid  and  settled,  for  the  country  was  one  hundred  years 
old  when  Columbus  discovered  America.  The  principal  crop 
is  corn,  and  they  raise  it  and  grind  it  just  as  their  great-great- 
great-grandfathers  did.  They  plow  with  a  board  slightly  shod 
with  iron;  their  trifling  little  harrows  are  drawn  by  men  and 
women;  small  windmills  grind  the  corn,  ten  bushels  a  day, 
and  there  is  one  assistant  superintendent  to  feed  the  mill  and  a 
general  superintendent  to  stand  by  and  keep  him  from  going  to 
sleep.  When  the  wind  changes  they  hitch  on  some  donkeys, 
and  actually  turn  the  whole  upper  half  of  the  mill  around  until 
the  sails  are  in  proper  position,  instead  of  fixing  the  concern  so 
that  the  sails  could  be  moved  instead  of  the  mill.  Oxen  tread 
the  wheat  from  the  ear,  after  the  fashion  prevalent  in  the  time 
of  Methuselah.  There  is  not  a  wheelbarrow  in  the  land — they 
carry  everything  on  their  heads,  or  on  donkeys,  or  in  a  wicker- 
bodied  cart,  whose  wheels  are  solid  blocks  of  wood  and  whose 
axles  turn  with  the  wheel.  There  is  not  a  modern  plow  in 
the  islands,  or  a  threshing-machine.  All  attempts  to  introduce 
them  have  failed.  The  good  Catholic  Portuguese  crossed  him 
self  and  prayed  God  to  shield  him  from  all  blasphemous  desire 
to  know  more  than  his  father  did  before  him.  The  climate  is 

29 


30  MARK  TWAIN 

mild;  they  never  have  snow  or  ice,  and  I  saw  no  chimneys  in 
the  town.  The  donkeys  and  the  men,  women,  and  children  of 
a  family,  all  eat  and  sleep  in  the  same  room,  and  are  unclean,  are 
ravaged  by  vermin,  and  are  truly  happy.  The  people  lie,  and 
cheat  the  stranger,  and  are  desperately  ignorant  and  have  hardly 
any  reverence  for  their  dead.  The  latter  trait  shows  how  little 
better  they  are  than  the  donkeys  they  eat  and  sleep  with.  The 
only  well-dressed  Portuguese  in  the  camp  are  the  half  a  dozen 
well-to-do  families,  the  Jesuit  priests,  and  the  soldiers  of  the 
little  garrison.  The  wages  of  a  laborer  are  twenty  to  twenty- 
four  cents  a  day,  and  those  of  a  good  mechanic  about  twice  as 
much.  They  count  it  in  reis  at  a  thousand  to  the  dollar,  and 
this  makes  them  rich  and  contented.  Fine  grapes  used  to  grow 
in  the  islands,  and  an  excellent  wine  was  made  and  exported. 
But  a  disease  killed  all  the  vines  fifteen  years  ago,  and  since 
that  time  no  wine  has  been  made.  The  islands  being  wholly  of 
volcanic  origin,  the  soil  is  necessarily  very  rich.  Nearly  every 
foot  of  ground  is  under  cultivation,  and  two  or  three  crops  a 
year  of  each  article  are  produced,  but  nothing  is  exported  save 
a  few  oranges — chiefly  to  England.  Nobody  comes  here,  and 
nobody  goes  away.  News  is  a  thing  unknown  in  Fayal.  A 
thirst  for  it  is  a  passion  equally  unknown.  A  Portuguese  of 
average  intelligence  inquired  if  our  civil  war  was  over  because, 
he  said  somebody  had  told  him  it  was — or,  at  least,  it  ran  in  his 
mind,  that  somebody  had  told  him  something  like  that !  A^nd 
when  a  passenger  gave  an  officer  of  the  garrison  copies  of  the 
Tribune,  the  Herald,  and  Times,  he  was  surprised  to  find  later 
news  in  them  from  Lisbon  than  he  had  just,  received  by  the 
little  monthly  steamer.  He  was  told  that  it  came  by  cable. 
He  said  he  knew  they  had  tried  to  lay  a  cable  ten  years  ago,  but 
it  had  been  in  his  mind,  somehow,  that  they  hadn't  succeeded ! 

It  is  in  communities  like  this  that  Jesuit  humbuggery 
flourishes.  We  visited  a  Jesuit  cathedral  nearly  two  hundred 
years  old,  and  found  in  it  a  piece  of  the  veritable  cross  upon 
which  our  Savior  was  crucified.  It  was  polished  and  hard, 
and  in  as  excellent  a  state  of  preservation  as  if  the  dread  tragedy 
on  Calvary  had  occurred  yesterday  instead  of  eighteen  centuries 
ago.  But  these  confiding  people  believe  in  that  piece  of  wood 
unhesitatingly. 

In  a  chapel  of  the  cathedral  is  an  altar  with  facings  of  solid 
silver — at  least,  they  call  it  so,  and  I  think  myself  it  would  go 
a  couple  of  hundred  to  the  ton  (to  speak  after  the  fashion  of 
the  silver  miners),  and  before  it  is  kept  forever  burning  a  small 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  31 

lamp.  A  devout  lady  who  died,  left  money  and  contracted  for 
unlimited  masses  for  the  repose  of  her  soul,  and  also  stipulated 
that  this  lamp  should  be  kept  lighted  always,  day  and  night. 
She  did  all  this  before  she  died,  you  understand.  It  is  a  very 
small  lamp,  and  a  very  dim  one,  and  it  could  not  work  her 
much  damage,  I  think,  if  it  went  out  altogether. 

The  great  altar  of  the  cathedral,  and  also  three  or  four  minor 
ones,  are  a  perfect  mass  of  gilt  gimcracks  and  gingerbread. 
And  they  have  a  swarm  of  rusty,  dusty,  battered  apostles  stand 
ing  around  the  filigree  work,  some  on  one  leg  and  some  with 
one  eye  out  but  a  gamey  look  in  the  other,  and  some  with  two  or 
three  fingers  gone,  and  some  with  not  enough  nose  left  to  blow 
— all  of  them  crippled  and  discouraged,  and  fitter  subjects  for 
the  hospital  than  the  cathedral. 

The  walls  of  the  chancel  are  of  porcelain,  all  pictured  over 
with  figures  of  almost  life-size,  very  elegantly  wrought,  and 
dressed  in  the  fanciful  costumes  of  two  centuries  ago.  The 
design  was  a  history  of  something  or  somebody,  but  none  of 
us  were  learned  enough  to  read  the  story.  The  old  father, 
reposing  under  a  stone  close  by,  dated  1686,  might  have  told 
us  if  he  could  have  risen.  But  he  didn't. 

As  we  came  down  through  the  town,  we  encountered  a  squad 
of  little  donkeys  ready  saddled  for  use.  The  saddles  were 
peculiar,  to  say  the  least.  They  consisted  of  a  sort  of  saw-buck, 
with  a  small  mattress  on  it,  and  this  furniture  covered  about 
half  the  donkey.  There  were  no  stirrups,  but  really  such 
supports  were  not  needed — to  use  such  a  saddle  was  next 
thing  to  riding  a  dinner-table — there  was  ample  support  clear 
out  to  one's  knee-joints.  A  pack  of  ragged  Portuguese 
muleteers  crowded  around  us  offering  their  beasts  at  half  a 
dollar  an  hour — more  rascality  to  the  stranger,  for  the  market 
price  is  sixteen  cents.  Half  a  dozen  of  us  mounted  the  ungainly 
affairs,  and  submitted  to  the  indignity  of  making  a  ridiculous 
spectacle  of  ourselves  through  the  principal  streets  of  a  town 
of  10,000  inhabitants. 

We  started.  It  was  not  a  trot,  a  gallop,  or  a  canter,  but  a 
stampede,  and  made  up  of  all  possible  or  conceivable  gaits. 
No  spurs  were  necessary.  There  was  a  muleteer  to  every 
donkey  and  a  dozen  volunteers  besides,  and  they  banged  the 
donkeys  with  their  goad-sticks,  and  pricked  them  with  their 
spikes,  and  shouted  something  that  sounded  like  "Sekki-yah !" 
and  kept  up  a  din  and  racket  that  was  worse  than  Bedlam 
itself.  These  rascals  were  all  on  foot,  but  no  matter,  they  were 


32  MARK  TWAIN 

always  up  to  time — they  can  outrun  and  outlast  a  donkey. 
Altogether  ours  was  a  lively  and  picturesque  procession,  and 
drew  crowded  audiences  to  the  balconies  wherever  we  went. 

Blucher  could  do  nothing  at  all  with  his  donkey.  The  beast 
scampered  zigzag  across  the  road  and  the  others  ran  into  him ; 
he  scraped  Blucher  against  carts  and  the  corners  of  houses; 
the  road  was  fenced  in  with  high  stone  walls,  and  the  donkey 
gave  him  a  polishing  first  on  one  side  and  then  on  the  other,  but 
never  once  took  the  middle ;  he  finally  came  to  the  house  he  was 
born  in  and  darted  into  the  parlor,  scraping  Blucher  off  at  the 
doorway.  After  remounting,  Blucher  said  to  the  muleteer, 
"Now,  that's  enough,  you  know;  you  go  slow  hereafter."  But 
the  fellow  knew  no  English  and  did  not  understand,  so  he 
simply  said,  "Sekki-yahl"  and  the  donkey  was  off  again  like 
a  shot.  He  turned  a  corner  suddenly,  and  Blucher  went  over 
his  head.  And,  to  speak  truly,  every  mule  stumbled  over  the 
two,  and  the  whole  cavalcade  was  piled  up  in  a  heap.  No  harm 
done.  A  fall  from  one  of  those  donkeys  is  of  little  more  con 
sequence  than  rolling  off  a  sofa.  The  donkeys  all  stood  still 
after  the  catastrophe,  and  waited  for  their  dismembered  saddles 
to  be  patched  up  and  put  on  by  the  noisy  muleteers.  Blucher 
was  pretty  angry,  and  wanted  to  swear,  but  every  time  he  opened 
his  mouth  his  animal  did  so  also,  and  let  off  a  series  of  brays 
that  drowned  all  other  sounds. 

It  was  fun,  skurrying  around  the  breezy  hills  and  through 
the  beautiful  canons.  There  was  that  rare  thing,  novelty, 
about  it;  it  was  a  fresh,  new,  exhilarating  sensation,  this 
donkey-riding,  and  worth  a  hundred  worn  and  threadbare 
home  pleasures. 

The  roads  were  a  wonder,  and  well  they  might  be.  Here 
was  an  island  with  only  a  handful  of  people  in  it — 25,000—  - 
and  yet  such  fine  roads  do  not  exist  in  the  United  States  out 
side  of  Central  Park.  Everywhere  you  go,  in  any  direction, 
you  find  either  a  hard,  smooth,  level  thoroughfare,  just 
sprinkled  with  black  lava  sand,  and  bordered  with  little  gut 
ters  neatly  paved  with  small  smooth  pebbles,  or  compactly 
paved  ones  like  Broadway.  They  talk  much  of  the  Russ  pave 
ment  in  New  York,  and  call  it  a  new  invention — yet  here  they 
have  been  using  it  in  this  remote  little  isle  of  the  sea  for  two 
hundred  years!  Every  street  in  Horta  is  handsomely  paved 
with  the  heavy  Russ  blocks,  and  the  surface  is  neat  and  true 
as  a  floor — not  marred  by  holes  like  Broadway.  And  every 
road  is  fenced  in  by  tall,  solid  lava  walls,  which  will  last  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  33 

thousand  years  in  this  land  where  frost  is  unknown.  They 
are  very  thick,  and  are  often  plastered  and  whitewashed,  and 
capped  with  projecting  slabs  of  cut  stone.  Trees  from  gar 
dens  above  hang  their  swaying  tendrils  down,  and  contrast 
their  bright  green  with  the  whitewash  or  the  black  lava  of  the 
walls,  and  make  them  beautiful.  The  trees  and  vines  stretch 
across  these  narrow  roadways  sometimes,  and  so  shut  out 
the  sun  that  you  seem  to  be  riding  through  a  tunnel.  The 
pavements,  the  roads,  and  the  bridges  are  all  government  work. 

The  bridges  are  of  a  single  span — a  single  arch — of  cut 
stone,  without  a  support,  and  paved  on  top  with  flags  of  lava 
and  ornamental  pebble  work.  Everywhere  are  walls,  walls, 
walls, — and  all  of  them  tasteful  and  handsome! — and  eternally 
substantial ;  and  everywhere  are  those  marvelous  pavements,  so 
neat,  so  smooth,  and  so  indestructible.  And  if  ever  roads  and 
streets,  and  the  outsides  of  houses,  were  perfectly  free  from 
•  any  sign  or  semblance  of  dirt  or  dust  or  mud,  or  uncleanliness 
of  any  kind,  it  is  Horta,  it  is  Fayal.  The  lower  classes  of  the 
people,  in  their  persons  and  their  domiciles,  are  not  clean — 
but  there  it  stops — the  town  and  the  island  are  miracles  of 
cleanliness. 

"We  arrived  home  again  finally,  after  a  ten-mile  excursion, 

I  and  the  irrepressible  muleteers  scampered  at  our  heels  through 

the  main  street,  goading  the  donkeys,  shouting  the  everlasting 

"Sckki-yah"  and   singing  "John  Brown's  Body"   in   ruinous 

English. 

When  we  were  dismounted  and  it  came  to  settling,  the  shout 
ing  and  jawring  and  swearing  and  quarreling  among  the  mule 
teers  and  with  us,  was  nearly  deafening.  One  fellow  would 
demand  a  dollar  an  hour  for  the  use  of  his  donkey;  another 
claimed  half  a  dollar  for  pricking  him  up,  another  a  quarter 
for  helping  in  that  service,  and  about  fourteen  guides  pre 
sented  bills  for  showing  us  the  way  through  the  town  and  its 
environs;  and  every  vagrant  of  them  was  more  vociferous, 
and  more  vehement,  and  more  frantic  in  gesture  than  his  neigh 
bor.  We  paid  one  guide,  and  paid  for  one  muleteer  to  each 
donkey. 

The  mountains  on  some  of  the  islands  are  very  high.  We 
sailed  along  the  shore  of  the  Island  of  Pico,  under  a  stately 
green  pyramid  that  rose  up  with  one  unbroken  sweep  from  our 
very  feet  to  an  altitude  of  7,613  feet,  and  thrust  its  summit 
above  the  white  clouds  like  an  island  adrift  in  a  fog! 

We  got  plenty  of  fresh  oranges,  lemons,  figs,  apricots,  etc., 


34  MARK  TWAIN 

in  these  Azores,  of  course.    But  I  will  desist.    I  am  not  here 
to  write  patent-office  reports. 

We  are  on  our  way  to  Gibraltar,  and  shall  reach  there  five 
or  six  days  out  from  the  Azores. 


CHAPTER   VII 

A  WEEK  of  buffeting  a  tempestuous  and  relentless  sea; 
a  week  of  seasickness  and  deserted  cabins;  of  lonely 
quarter-decks  drenched  with  spray — spray  so  ambi 
tious  that  it  even  coated  the  smokestacks  thick  with  a  white 
crust  of  salt  to  their  very  tops;  a  week  of  shivering  in  the 
shelter  of  the  lifeboats  and  deck-houses  by  day,  and  blowing 
suffocating  "clouds"  and  boisterously  performing  at  dominoes 
in  the  smoking-room  at  night. 

And  the  last  night  of  the  seven  was  the  stormiest  of  all. 
There  was  no  thunder,  no  noise  but  the  pounding  bows  of  the 
ship,  the  keen  whistling  of  the  gale  through  the  cordage,  and 
the  rush  of  the  seething  waters.  But  the  vessel  climbed  aloft 
as  if  she  would  climb  to  heaven — then  paused  an  instant  that 
seemed  a  century,  and  plunged  headlong  down  again,  as  from  a 
precipice.  The  sheeted  sprays  drenched  the  decks  like  rain. 
The  blackness  of  darkness  was  everywhere.  At  long  intervals  a 
flash  of  lightning  clove  it  with  a  quivering  line  of  fire,  that 
revealed  a  heaving  world  of  water  where  was  nothing  before, 
kindled  the  dusky  cordage  to  glittering  silver,  and  lit  up  the 
faces  of  the  men  with  a  ghastly  luster ! 

Fear  drove  many  on  deck  that  were  used  to  avoiding  the 
night  winds  and  the  spray.  Some  thought  the  vessel  could 
not  live  through  the  night,  and  it  seemed  less  dreadful  to  stand 
out  in  the  midst  of  the  wild  tempest  and  see  the  peril  that 
threatened  than  to  be  shut  up  in  the  sepulchral  cabins,  under 
the  dim  lamps,  and  imagine  the  horrors  that  were  abroad  on 
the  ocean.  And  once  out — once  where  they  could  see  the  ship 
struggling  in  the  strong  grasp  of  the  storm — once  where  they 
could  hear  the  shriek  of  the  winds,  and  face  the  driving  spray 
and  look  out  upon  the  majestic  picture  the  lightnings  dis 
closed,  they  were  prisoners  to  a  fierce  fascination  they  could 
not  resist,  and  so  remained.  It  was  a  wild  night — and  a  very, 
very  long  one. 

Everybody  was  sent  scampering  to  the  deck  at  seven  o'clock 
this  lovely  morning  of  the  30th  of  June  with  the  glad  news 
that  land  was  in  sight!  It  was  a  rare  thing  and  a  joyful,  to 

ob 


36  MARK  TWAIN 

see  all  the  ship's  family  abroad  once  more,  albeit  the  happiness 
that  sat  upon  every  countenance  could  only  partly  conceal  the 
ravages  which  that  long  siege  of  storm  had  wrought  there. 
But  dull  eyes  soon  sparkled  with  pleasure,  pallid  cheeks  flushed 
again,  and  frames  weakened  by  sickness  gathered  new  life 
from  the  quickening  influences  of  the  bright,  fresh  morning. 
Yea,  and  from  a  still  more  potent  influence:  the  worn  casta 
ways  were  to  see  the  blessed  land  again! — and  to  see  it  was  to 
bring  back  that  mother-land  that  was  in  all  their  thoughts. 

Within  the  hour  we  were  fairly  within  the  Straits  of 
Gibraltar,  the  tall  yellow-splotched  hills  of  Africa  on  our  right, 
with  their  bases  veiled  in  a  blue  haze  and  their  summits  swathed 
in  clouds — the  same  being  according  to  Scripture,  which  says 
that  "clouds  and  darkness  are  over  the  land."  The  words  were 
spoken  of  this  particular  portion  of  Africa,  I  believe.  On  our 
left  were  the  granite-ribbed  domes  of  old  Spain.  The  Strait  is 
only  thirteen  miles  wide  in  its  narrowest  part. 

At  short  intervals,  along  the  Spanish  shore,  were  quaint- 
looking  old  stone  towers — Moorish,  we  thought — but  learned 
better  afterward.  In  former  times  the  Morocco  rascals  used 
to  coast  along  the  Spanish  Main  in  their  boats  till  a  safe  oppor 
tunity  seemed  to  present  itself,  and  then  dart  in  and  capture 
a  Spanish  village,  and  carry  off  all  the  pretty  women  they  could 
find.  It  was  a  pleasant  business,  and  was  very  popular.  The 
Spaniards  built  these  watch-towers  on  the  hills  to  enable  them 
to  keep  a  sharper  lookout  on  the  Moroccan  speculators, 

The  picture,  on  the  other  hand,  was  very  beautiful  to  eyes 
weary  of  the  changeless  sea,  and  by  and  by  the  ship's  com 
pany  grew  wonderfully  cheerful.  But  while  we  stood  admir 
ing  the  cloud-capped  peaks  and  the  lowlands  robed  in  mi^ty 
gloom,  a  finer  picture  burst  upon  us  and  chained  every  eye  like  a 
magnet — a  stately  ship,  with  canvas  piled  on  canvas  till  sh£ 
was  one  towering  mass  of  bellying  sail !  She  came  speeding 
over  the  sea  like  a  great  bird.  Africa  and  Spain  were  for 
gotten.  All  homage  was  for  the  beautiful  stranger.  While 
everybody  gazed,  she  swept  superbly  by  and  flung  the  Stars 
and  Stripes  to  the  breeze!  Quicker  than  thought,  hats  and 
handkerchiefs  flashed  in  the  air,  and  a  cheer  went  up!  She 
was  beautiful  before — she  was  radiant  now.  Many  a  one  on 
our  decks  knew  then  for  .the  first  time  how  tame  a  sight  his 
country's  flag  is  at  home  compared  to  what  it  is  in  a  foreign 
land.  To  see  it  is  to  see  a  vision  of  home  itself  and  all  its 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  37 

idols,  and  feel  a  thrill  that  would  stir  a  very  river  of  sluggish 
blood ! 

We  were  approaching  the  famed  Pillars  of  Hercules,  and 
already  the  African  one,  "Ape's  Hill,"  a  grand  old  mountain 
with  summit  streaked  with  granite  ledges,  was  in  sight.  The 
other,  the  great  Rock  of  Gibraltar,  was  yet  to  come.  (The 
ancients  considered  the  Pillars  of  Hercules  the  head  of  navi-  ; 
gation  and  the  end  of  the  world.  The  information  the  ancients 
didn't  have  was  very  voluminous.  Even  the  phophets  wrote 
book  after  book  and  epistle  after  epistle,  yet  never  once  hinted 
at  the  existence  of  a  great  continent  on  our  side  of  the  water; 
yet  they  must  have  known  it  was  there,  I  should  thinlcT\ 

In  a  few  moments  a  lonely  and  enormous  mass  of  rock, 
standing  seemingly  in  the  center  of  the  wide  strait  and  appar 
ently  washed  on  all  sides  by  the  sea,  swung  magnificently  into 
view,  and  we  needed  no  tedious  traveled  parrot  to  tell  us  it 
:Was  Gibraltar.  There  could  not  be  two  rocks  like  that  in  one 
kingdom. 

The  Rock  of  Gibraltar  is  about  a  mile  and  a  half  long,  I 
should  say,  by  1,400  to  1,500  feet  high,  and  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
wide  at  its  base.  One  side  and  one  end  of  it  come  about  as 
straight  up  out  of  the  sea  as  the  side  of  a  house,  the  other  end 
is  irregular  and  the  other  side  is  a  steep  slant  which  an  army 
would  find  very  difficult  to  climb.  At  the  foot  of  this  slant  is 
the  walled  town  of  Gibraltar — or  rather  the  town  occupies  part 
of  the  slant.  Everywhere— on  hillside,  in  the  precipice,  by 
the  sea,  on  the  heights, — everywhere  you  choose  to  look,  Gib 
raltar  is  clad  with  masonry  and  bristling  with  guns.  It  makes 
a  striking  and  lively  picture,  from  whatsoever  point  you  con 
template  it.  It  is  pushed  out  into  the  sea  on  the  end  of  a  flat, 
narrow  strip  of  land,  and  is  suggestive  of  a  "gob"  of  mud  on 
the  end  of  a  shingle.  A  few  hundred  yards  of  this  flat  ground 
at  its  base  belongs  to  the  English,  and  then,  extending  across 
the  strip  from  the  Alantic  to  the  Mediterranean,  a  distance  of 
a  quarter  of  a  mile,  comes  the  "Neutral  Ground,"  a  space  two 
or  three  hundred  yards  wide,  which  is  free  to  both  parties. 

"Are  you  going  through  Spain  to  Paris?"  That  question 
was  bandied  about  the  ship  day  and  night  from  Fayal  to  Gib 
raltar,  and  I  thought  I  never  could  get  so  tired  of  hearing  any 
one  combination  of  words  again,  or  more  tired  of  answering, 
"I  don't  know." 

At  the  last  moment  six  or  seven  had  sufficient  decision  of 
character  to  make  up  their  minds  to  go,  and  did  go,  and  I  felt 


38  MARK  TWAIN 

a  sense  of  relief  at  once— it  was  forever  too  late,  now,  and  I 
could  make  up  my  mind  at  my  leisure,  not  to  go.  I  must  have 
a  prodigious  quantity  of  mind ;  it  takes  me  as  much  as  a  week, 
sometimes,  to  make  it  up. 

But  behold  how  annoyances  repeat  themselves.  We  had  no 
sooner  gotten  rid  of  the  Spain  distress  than  the  Gibraltar 
guides  started  another — a  tiresome  repetition  of  a  legend  that 
had  nothing  very  astonishing  about  it,  even  in  the  first  place : 
"That  high  hill  yonder  is  called  the  Queen's  Chair;  it  is  be 
cause  one  of  the  queens  of  Spain  placed  her  chair  there  when 
the  French  and  Spanish  troops  were  besieging  Gibraltar,  and 
said  she  would  never  move  from  the  spot  till  the  English  flag 
was  lowered  from  the  fortresses.  If  the  English  hadn't  been 
gallant  enough  to  lower  the  flag  for  a  few  hours  one  day,  she'd 
have  had  to  break  her  oath  or  die  up  there." 

We  rode  on  asses  and  mules  up  the  steep,  narrow  streets 
and  entered  the  subterranean  galleries  the  English  have  blasted 
out  in  the  rock.  These  galleries  are  like  spacious  railway  tun 
nels,  and  at  short  intervals  in  them  great  guns  frown  out  upon 
sea  and  town  through  portholes  five  or  six  hundred  feet  above 
the  ocean.  There  is  a  mile  or  so  of  this  subterranean  work, 
and  it  must  have  cost  a  vast  deal  of  money  and  labor.  The 
gallery  guns  command  the  peninsula  and  the  harbors  of  both 
oceans,  but  they  might  as  well  not  be  there,  I  should  think, 
for  an  army  could  hardly  climb  the  perpendicular  wall  of  the 
rock  anyhow.  Those  lofty  portholes  afford  superb  views  of 
the  sea,  though.  At  one  place,  where  a  jutting  crag  was  hol 
lowed  out  into  a  great  chamber  whose  furniture  was  huge 
cannon  and  whose  windows  were  portholes,  a  glimpse  was 
caught  of  a  hill  not  far  away,  and  a  soldier  said : 

"That  high  hill  yonder  is  called  the  Queen's  Chair;  it  is  be 
cause  a  queen  of  Spain  placed  her  chair  there  once,  when  the  ] 
French  and  Spanish  troops  were  besieging  Gibraltar,  and  said 
she  would  never  move  from  the  spot  till  the  English  flag  was 
lowered  from  the  fortress.  If  the  English  hadn't  been  gal 
lant  enough  to  lower  the  flag  for  a  few  hours  one  day,  she'd 
have  had  to  break  her  oath  or  die  up  there." 

On  the  topmost  pinnacle  of  Gibraltar  we  halted  a  good  while, 
and  no  doubt  the  mules  were  tired.  They  had  a  right  to  be. 
The  military  road  was  good,  but  rather  steep,  and  there  was 
a  good  deal  of  it.  The  view  from  the  narrow  ledge  was  mag 
nificent  ;  from  it,  vessels  seeming  like  the  tiniest  little  toy  boats 
were  turned  into  noble  ships  by  the  telescopes ;  and  other  vessels 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  39 

that  were  fifty  miles  away,  and  even  sixty  they  said,  and  in 
visible  to  the  naked  eye,  could  be  clearly  distinguished  through 
those  same  telescopes.  Below,  on  one  side,  we  looked  down 
upon  an  endless  mass  of  batteries,  and  on  the  other  straight 
down  to  the  sea. 

While  I  was  resting  ever  so  comfortably  on  a  rampart,  and 
cooling  my  baking  head  in  the  delicious  breeze,  an  officious 
guide  belonging  to  another  party  came  up  and  said : 

"Senor,  that  high  hill  yonder  is  called  the  Queen's  Chair — " 

"Sir,  I  am  a  helpless  orphan  in  a  foreign  land.  Have  pity 
on  me.  Don't — now  don't  inflict  that  most  in-FERNAL  old 
legend  on  me  any  more  to-day  I" 

There — I  had  used  strong  language,  after  promising  I  would 
never  do  so  again;  but  the  provocation  was  more  than  human 
nature  could  bear.  If  you  had  been  bored  so,  when  you  had 
the  noble  panorama  of  Spain  and  Africa  and  the  blue  Mediter 
ranean  spread  about  your  feet,  and  wanted  to  gaze,  and 
enjoy,  and  surfeit  yourself  with  its  beauty  in  silence,  you 
might  have  even  burst  into  stronger  language  than  I  did. 

Gibraltar  has  stood  several  protracted  sieges,  one  of  them  of 
nearly  four  years'  duration  (it  failed),  and  the  English  only 
captured  it  by  stratagem.  The  wonder  is  that  anybody  should 
ever  dream  of  trying  so  impossible  a  project  as  the  taking  it 
by  assault — and  yet  it  has  been  tried  more  than  once. 

The  Moors  held  the  place  twelve  hundred  years  ago,  and 
a  stanch  old  castle  of  theirs  of  that  date  still  frowns  from  the 
middle  of  the  town,  with  mossgrown  battlements  and  sides  well 
scarred  by  shots  fired  in  battles  and  sieges  that  are  forgotten 
now.  A  secret  chamber,  in  the  rock  behind  it,  was  discovered 
some  time  ago,  which  contained  a  sword  of  exquisite  work 
manship,  and  some  quaint  old  armor  of  a  fashion  that  anti 
quaries  are  not  acquainted  with,  though  it  is  supposed  to  be 
Roman.  Roman  armor  and  Roman  relics,  of  various  kinds, 
have  been  found  in  a  cave  in  the  sea  extremity  of  Gibraltar; 
history  says  Rome  held  this  part  of  the  country  about  the 
Christian  era,  and  these  things  seem  to  confirm  the  statement. 
£tn  that  cave,  also,  are  found  human  bones,  crusted  with  a 
very  thick,  stony  coating,  and  wise  men  have  ventured  to  say 
that  those  men  not  only  lived  before  the  flood,  but  as  much  as 
ten  thousand  years  before  it.  It  may  be  true — it  looks  rea 
sonable  enough — but  as  long  as  those  parties  can't  vote  any 
more,  the  matter  can  be  of  no  great  public  interestT]  In  this 
cave,  likewise,  are  found  skeletons  and  fossils  of  animals  that 


40  MARK  TWAIN 

exist  in  every  part  of  Africa,  yet  within  memory  and  tradition 
have  never  existed  in  any  portion  of  Spain  save  this  lone  peak 
of  Gibraltar !  So  the  theory  is  that  the  channel  between  Gib 
raltar  and  Africa  was  once  dry  land,  and  that  the  low,  neu 
tral  neck  between  Gibraltar  and  the  Spanish  hills  behind  it  was 
once  ocean,  and,  of  course,  that  these  African  animals,  being 
over  at  Gibraltar  (after  rock,  perhaps — there  is  plenty  there), 
got  closed  out  when  the  great  change  occurred.  The  hills  in 
Africa,  across  the  channel,  are  full  of  apes,  and  there  are  now, 
and  always  have  been,  apes  on  the  rock  of  Gibraltar — but  not 
elsewhere  in  Spain !  The  subject  is  an  interesting  one. 

There  is  an  English  garrison  at  Gibraltar  of  6,000  or  7,000 
men,  and  so  uniforms  of  flaming  red  are  plenty;  and  red  and 
blue,  and  undress  costumes  of  snowy  white,  and  also  the  queer 
uniform  of  the  bare-kneed  Highlander;  and  one  sees  soft-eyed 
Spanish  girls  from  San  Roque,  and  veiled  Moorish  beauties 
^1  suppose  they  are  beauties)  from  Tarifa,  and  turbaned, 
sashed,  and  trousered  Moorish  merchants  from  Fez,  and  long- 
robed,  bare-legged,  ragged  Mohammedan  vagabonds  from  Tet- 
ouan  and  Tangier,  some  brown,  some  yellow,  and  some  as  black 
as  virgin  ink — and  Jews  from  all  around,  in  gaberdine,  skull 
cap,  and  slippers,  just  as  they  are  in  pictures  and  theaters,  and 
just  as  they  were  three  thousand  years  ago,  no  doubt.  You  can 
easily  understand  that  a  tribe  (somehow  our  pilgrims  suggest 
that  expression,  because  they  march  in  a  straggling  procession 
through  these  foreign  places  with  such  an  Indian-like  air  of 
complacency  and  independence  about  them)  like  ours,  made 
up  from  fifteen  or  sixteen  states  of  the  Union,  found  enough 
to  stare  at  in  this  shifting  panorama  of  fashion  to-day. 

Speaking  of  our  pilgrims  reminds  me  that  we  have  one  or 
two  people  among  us  who  are  sometimes  an  annoyance.  How-, 
ever,  I  do  not  count  the  Oracle  in  that  list.  I  will  explain  that 
the  Oracle  is  an  innocent  old  ass  who  eats  for  four  and  looks 
wiser  than  the  whole  Academy  of  France  v/ould  have  any  right 
to  look,  and  never  uses  a  one-syllable  word  when  he  can  think 
of  a  longer  one,  and  never  by  any  possible  chance  knows  the 
meaning  of  any  word  he  uses,  or  ever  gets  it  in  the  right  place ; 
yet  he  will  serenely  venture  an  opinion  on  the  most  abstruse 
subject,  and  back  it  up  complacently  with  quotations  from 
authors  who  never  existed,  and  finally  when  cornered  will  slide 
to  the  other  side  of  the  question,  say  he  has  been  there  all  the 
time,  and  come  back  at  you  with  your  own  spoken  arguments, 
only  with  the  big  words  all  tangled,  and  play  them  in  your 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  41 

very  teeth  as  original  with  himself.  He  reads  a  chapter  in  the 
guide-books,  mixes  the  facts  all  up,  with  his  bad  memory,  and 
then  goes  off  to  inflict  the  whole  mess  on  somebody  as  wisdom 
which  has  been  festering  in  his  brain  for  years,  and  which  he 
gathered  in  college  from  erudite  authors  who  are  dead  now 
and  out  of  print.  This  morning  at  breakfast  he  pointed  out  of 
the  window,  and  said : 

"Do  you  see  that  there  hill  out  there  on  that  African  coast? 
It's  one  of  them  Pillows  of  Herkewls,  I  should  say — and  there's 
the  ultimate  one  alongside  of  it." 

"The  ultimate  one — that  is  a  good  word — but  the  Pillars  are 
not  both  on  the  same  side  of  the  strait."  (I  saw  he  had  been 
deceived  by  a  carelessly  written  sentence  in  the  Guide-Book.) 

"Well,  it  ain't  for  you  to  say,  nor  for  me.  Some  authors 
states  it  that  way,  and  some  states  it  different.  Old  Gibbons 
don't  say  nothing  about  it, — just  shirks  it  complete — Gibbons 
always  done  that  when  he  got  stuck — but  there  is  Rolampton, 
what  does  he  say?  Why,  he  says  that  they  was  both  on  the 
same  side,  and  Trinculian,  and  Sobaster,  and  Syraccus,  and 
Longomarganbl — ' ' 

"Oh,  that  will  do — that's  enough.  If  you  have  got  your  hand 
in  for  inventing  authors  and  testimony,  I  have  nothing  more  to 
say — let  them  be  on  the  same  side." 

We  don't  mind  the  Oracle.  We  rather  like  him.  We  can 
tolerate  the  Oracle  very  easily ;  but  we  have  a  poet  and  a  good- 
natured,  enterprising  idiot  on  board,  and  they  do  distress  the 
company.  The  one  gives  copies  of  his  verses  to  consuls,  com 
manders,  hotel-keepers,  Arabs,  Dutch, — to  anybody,  in  fact, 
who  will  submit  to  a  grievous  infliction  most  kindly  meant. 
His  poetry  is  all  very  well  on  shipboard,  notwithstanding  when 
he  wrote  an  "Ode  to  the  Ocean  in  a  Storm"  in  one  half -hour, 
and  an  "Apostrophe  to  the  Rooster  in  the  Waist  of  the  Ship" 
in  the  next,  the  transition  was  considerd  to  be  rather  abrupt; 
but  when  he  sends  an  invoice  of  rhymes  to  the  governor  of 
Fayal  and  another  to  the  commander-in-chief  and  other  digni 
taries  in  Gibraltar,  with  the  compliments  of  the  Laureate  of 
the  Ship,  it  is  not  popular  with  the  passengers. 

The  other  personage  I  have  mentioned  is  young  and  green, 
and  not  bright,  not  learned,  and  not  wise.  He  will  be,  though, 
some  day,  if  he  recollects  the  answers  to  all  his  questions.  He 
is  known  about  the  ship  as  the  "Interrogation  Point,"  and  this 
by  constant  use  has  become  shortened  to  "Interrogation."  He 
has  distinguished  himself  twice  already.  In  Fayal  they  pointed 


42  MARK  TWAIN 

out  a  hill  and  told  him  it  was  eight  hundred  feet  high  and 
eleven  hundred  feet  long.  And  they  told  him  there  was  a  tun 
nel  two  thousand  feet  long  and  one  thousand  feet  high  run 
ning  through  the  hill,  from  end  to  end.  He  believed  it.  He 
repeated  it  to  everybody,  discussed  it,  and  read  it  from  his 
notes.  Finally  he  took  a  useful  hint  from  this  remark  which 
a  thoughtful  old  pilgrim  made : 

"Well,  yes,  it  is  a  little  remarkable— singular  tunnel  alto 
gether — stands  up  out  of  the  top  of  the  hill  about  two  hun 
dred  feet,  and  one  end  of  it  sticks  out  of  the  hill  about  nine 
hundred !" 

Here  in  Gibraltar  he  corners  these  educated  British  officers 
and  badgers  them  with  braggadocio  about  America  and  the 
wonders  she  can  perform.  He  told  one  of  them  a  couple  of 
our  gunboats  could  come  here  and  knock  Gibraltar  into  the 
Mediterranean  sea ! 

At  this  present  moment,  half  a  dozen  of  us  are  taking  a 
private  pleasure  excursion  of  our  own  devising.  We  form 
rather  more  than  half  the  list  of  white  passengers  on  board  a 
small  steamer  bound  for  the  venerable  Moorish  town  of  Tan 
gier,  Africa.  Nothing  could  be  more  absolutely  certain  than 
that  we  are  enjoying  ourselves.  One  cannot  do  otherwise  who 
speeds  over  these  sparkling  waters,  and  breathes  the  soft  atmo 
sphere  of  this  sunny  land.  Care  cannot  assail  us  here.  We  are 
out  of  its  jurisdiction. 

We  even  steamed  recklessly  by  the  frowning  fortress  of 
Malabat  (a  stronghold  of  the  Emperor  of  Morocco),  with 
out  a  twinge  of  fear.  The  whole  garrison  turned  out  under 
arms,  and  assumed  a  threatening  attitude — yet  still  we  did  not 
fear.  The  entire  garrison  marched  and  countermarched,  with 
in  the  rampart,  in  full  view — yet  notwithstanding  even  this, 
we  never  flinched. 

I  suppose  we  really  do  not  know  what  fear  is.  I  inquired 
the  name  of  the  garrison  of  the  fortress  of  Malabat,  and  they 
said  it  was  Mehemet  Ali  Ben  Sancom.  I  said  it  would  be  a 
good  idea  to  get  some  more  garrisons  to  help  him ;  but  they 
said  no ;  he  had  nothing  to  do  but  hold  the  place,  and  that  he 
was  competent  to  do  that ;  had  done  it  two  years  already.  That 
was  evidence  which  one  could  not  well  refute.  There  is  noth 
ing  like  reputation. 

Every  now  and  then,  my  glove  purchase  in  Gibraltar  last 
night  intrudes  itself  upon  me.  Dan  and  the  ship's  surgeon 
and  I  had  been  up  to  the  great  square,  listening  to  the  music 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  43 

of  the  fine  military  bands,  and  contemplating  English  and 
Spanish  female  loveliness  and  fashion,  and,  at  9  o'clock,  were 
on  our  way  to  the  theater,  when  we  met  the  General,  the  Judge 
the  Commodore,  the  Colonel,  and  the  Commissioner  of  the 
United  States  of  America  to  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa,  who 
had  been  to  the  Club  House,  to  register  their  several  titles  and 
impoverish  the  bill  of  fare ;  and  they  told  us  to  go  over  to  the 
little  variety  store,  near  the  Hall  of  Justice,  and  buy  some  kid 
gloves.  They  said  they  were  elegant,  and  very  moderate  in 
price.  It  seemed  a  stylish  thing  to  go  to  the  theater  in  kid 
gloves,  and  we  acted  upon  the  hint.  A  very  handsome  young 
lady  in  the  store  offered  me  a  pair  of  blue  gloves.  I  did  not 
want  blue,  but  she  said  they  would  look  very  pretty  on  a  hand 
like  mine.  The  remark  touched  me  tenderly.  I  glanced  fur 
tively  at  my  hand,  and  somehow  it  did  seem  rather  a  comely 
member.  I  tried  a  glove  on  my  left,  and  blushed  a  little. 
Manifestly  the  size  was  too  small  for  me.  But  I  felt  gratified 
when  she  said : 

"Oh,  it  is  just  right !" — yet  I  knew  it  was  no  such  thing. 

I  tugged  at  it  diligently,  but  it  was  discouraging  work.  She 
said : 

"Ah !  I  see  you  are  accustomed  to  wearing  kid  gloves — but 
some  gentlemen  are  so  awkward  about  putting  them  on. 

It  was  the  last  compliment  I  had  expected.  I  only  under 
stand  putting  on  the  buckskin  article  perfectly.  I  made  an 
other  effort,  and  tore  the  glove  from  the  base  of  the  Kmmb 
into  the  palm  of  the  hand — and  tried  to  hide  the  rent.  She 
kept  up  her  compliments,  and  I  kept  up  my  determination  to 
deserve  them  or  die : 

"Ah.  you  have  had  experience!"  [A  rip  down  the  back  of 
the  hand.]  "They  are  just  right  for  you — your  hand  is  very 
small — if  they  tear  you  need  not  pay  for  them."  [A  rent 
across  the  middle]  "I  can  always  tell  when  a  gentleman 
understands  putting  on  kid  gloves.  There  is  a  grace  about  it 
that  only  comes  with  long  practice."  [The  whole  after  guard 
of  the  glove  "fetched  away,"  as  the  sailors  say,  the  fabric 
parted  across  the  knuckles,  and  nothing  was  left  but  a  melan 
choly  ruin.] 

I  was  too  much  flattered  to  make  an  exposure,  and  throw  the 
merchandise  on  the  angel's  hands.  I  was  hot,  vexed,  con 
fused,  but  still  happy;  but  I  hated  the  other  boys  for  taking 
such  an  absorbing  interest  in  the  proceedings.  I  wished  they 


44  MARK  TWAIN 

were  in  Jericho.     I  felt  exquisitely  mean  when  I  said  cheer 
fully^ 

"This  one  does  very  well ;  it  fits  elegantly.  I  like  a  glove 
that  fits.  No,  never  mind,  ma'am,  never  mind;  I'll  put  the 
other  on  in  the  street.  It  is  warm  here.'* 

It  was  warm.  It  was  the  warmest  place  I  ever  was  in.  I 
paid  the  bill,  and  as  I  passed  out  with  a  fascinating  bow,  I 
thought  I  detected  a  light  in  the  woman's  eye  that  was  gently 
ironical ;  and  when  I  looked  back  from  the  street,  and  she  was 
laughing  all  to  herself  about  something  or  other,  I  said  to 
myself  with  withering  sarcasm,  "Oh  certainly ;  you  know  how 
to  put  on  kid  gloves,  don't  you? — a  self-complacent  ass,  ready 
to  be  flattered  out  of  your  senses  by  every  petticoat  that  chooses 
to  take  the  trouble  to  do  it !" 

The  silence  of  the  boys  annoyed  me.  Finally,  Dan  said, 
musingly  : 

"Some  gentlemen  don't  know  how  to  put  on  kid  gloves  at  all ; 
but  some  do." 

And  the  doctor  said  (to  the  moon,  I  thought)  : 

"But  it  is  always  easy  to  tell  when  a  gentleman  is  used  to 
putting  on  kid  gloves." 

Dan  soliloquized,  after  a  pause: 

"Ah,  yes ;  there  is  a  grace  about  it  that  only  comes  with  long, 
very  long  practice." 

"Yes,  indeed,  I've  noticed  that  when  a  man  hauls  on  a  kid 
glove  like  he  was  dragging  a  cat  out  of  an  ash-hole  by  the  tail, 
he  understands  putting  on  kid  gloves;  he's  had  ex — " 

"Boys,  enough  of  a  thing's  enough !  You  think  you  are  very 
smart,  I  suppose,  but  I  don't.  And  if  you  go  and  tell  any  of 
those  old  gossips  in  the  ship  abont  this  thing,  I'll  never  for 
give  you  for  it;  that's  all." 

They  let  me  alone  then,  for  the  time  being.  We  always  let 
each  other  alone  in  time  to  prevent  ill  feeling  from  spoiling  a 
joke.  But  they  had  bought  gloves,  too,  as  I  did.  We  threw 
all  the  purchases  away  together  this  morning.  They  were 
coatrse,  unsubstantial,  freckled  all  over  with  broad  yellow 
splotches,  and  could  neither  stand  wear  nor  public  exhibition. 
We  had  entertained  an  angel  unawares,  but  we  did  not  take 
her  in.  She  did  that  for  us. 

Tangier !  A  tribe  of  stalwart  Moors  are  wading  into  the  sea 
to  carry  us  ashore  on  their  backs  from  the  small  boats. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THIS  is  royal!  Let  those  who  went  up  through  Spain 
make  the  best  of  it — these  dominions  of  the  Emperor  of 
Morocco  suit  our  little  party  well  enough.  We  have  had 
enough  of  Spain  at  Gibraltar  for  the  present.  Tangier  is 
the  spot  we  have  been  longing  for  all  the  time.  Elsewhere 
we  have  found  foreign-looking  things  and  foreign-looking 
people,  but  always  with  things  and  people  intermixed  that  we 
were  familiar  with  befor-e,  and  so  the  novelty  of  the  situation 
lost  a  deal  of  its  force.  i^We  wanted  something  thoroughly  and 
uncompromisingly  foreign  — foreign  from  top  to  bottom — - 
foreign  from  center  to  circumference — foreign  inside  and 
outside  and  all  around — nothing  anywhere  about  it  to  dilute 
its  foreignness — nothing  to  remind  us  of  any  other  people  or 
any  other  land  under  the  sun.  And  lo !  in  Tangier  we  have 
found  itT]  Here  is  not  the  slightest  thing  that  ever  we  have  j 
seen  savc"m  pictures — and  we  always  mistrusted  the  pictures 
before.  We  cannot  any  more.  The  pictures  used  to  seem 
exaggerations — they  seemed  too  weird  and  fanciful  for  reality. 
But  behold,  they  were  not  wild  enough — they  were. not  fanciful  , 
enough — they  have  not  told  half  the  story.  ^Tangier  is  a 
foreign  land  if  ever  there  was  one;  and  the  true  spirit  of  it 
can  never  be  found  in  any  book  save  the  Arabian  Nights. 
Here  are  no  white  men  visible,  yet  swarms  of  humanity  are 
all  about  us.  Here  is  a  packed  and  jammed  city  inclosed  in 
a  massive  stone  wall  which  is  more  than  a  thousand  years 
old.  All  the  houses  nearly  are  one  and  two  story;  made  of 
thick  walls  of  stone;  plastered  outside;  square  as  a  dry-goods 
box ;  flat  as  a  floor  on  top ;  no  cornices ;  whitewashed  all  over 
— a  crowded  city  of  snowy  tombs !  And  the  doors  are  arched 
with  a  peculiar  arch  we  see  in  Moorish  pictures ;  the  floors  are 
laid  in  vari-colored  diamond  flags ;  in  tassellated  many-colored 
porcelain  squares  wrought  in  the  furnaces  of  Fez ;  in  red  tiles 
and  broad  bricks  that  time  cannot  wear ;  there  is  no  furniture 
in  the  rooms  (of  Jewish  dwellings)  save  divans — what  there 
is  in  Moorish  ones  no  man  may  know;  within  their  sacred 
walls  no  Christian  dog  can  enter.  And  the  streets  are  oriental 
— some  of  them  three  feet  wide,  some  six,  but  only  two  that 

45 


46  MARK  TWAIN 

are  over  a  dozen;  a  man  can  blockade  the  most  of  them  by 
extending  his  body  across  them.  Isn't  it  an  oriental  picture? 
( There  are  stalwart  Bedouins  of  the  desert  here,  and  stately 
Mbors,  proud  of  a  history  that  goes  back  to  the  night  of 
time;  and  Jews,  whose  fathers  fled  hither  centuries  upon 
centuries  ago ;  and  swarthy  Riffians  from  the  mountains — born 
cutthroats — and  original,  genuine  negroes,  as  black  as  Moses; 
and  howling  dervishes,  and  a  hundred  breeds  of  Arabs — all 
sorts  and  descriptions  of  people  that  are  foreign  and  curious 
to  look  uporiT\ 

And  their  cresses  are  strange  beyond  all  description.  Here 
is  a  bronzed  Moor  in  a  prodigious  white  turban,  curiously 
embroidered  jacket,  gold  and  crimson  sash  of  many  folds, 
wrapped  round  and  round  his  waist,  trousers  that  only  come 
a  little  below  his  knee,  and  yet  have  twenty  yards  of  stuff  in 
them,  ornamented  simitar,  bare  shins,  stockingless  feet,  yellow 
slippers,  and  gun  of  preposterous  length — a  mere  soldier !— - 
I  thought  he  was  the  Emperor  at  least.  And  here  are  aged 
Moors  with  flowing  white  beards,  and  long  white  robes  with 
vast  cowls;  and  Bedouins  with  long,  cowled,  striped  cloaks, 
and  negroes  and  Riffians  with  heads  clean-shaven,  except  a 
kinky  scalp-lock  back  of  the  ear,  or  rather  up  on  the  after 
corner  of  the  skull,  and  all  sorts  of  barbarians  in  all  sorts  of 
weird  costumes,  and  all  more  or  less  ragged.  And  here  are 
Moorish  women  who  are  enveloped  from  head  to  foot  in 
coarse  white  robes  and  whose  sex  can  only  be  determined  by 
the  fact  that  they  only  leave  one  eye  visible,  and  never  look 
at  men  of  their  own  race,  or  are  looked  at  by  them  in  public. 
Here  are  five  thousand  Jews  in  blue  gaberdines,  sashes  about 
their  waists,  slippers  upon  their  feet,  little  skull-caps  upon  *he 
backs  of  their  heads,  hair  combed  down  on  the  forehead,  and 
cut  straight  across  the  middle  of  it  from  side  to  side — the  self 
same  fashion  their  Tangier  ancestors  have  worn  for  I  don't 
know  how  many  bewildering  centuries.  Their  feet  and  ankles 
are  bare.  Their  noses  are  all  hooked,  and  hooked  alike.  They 
all  resemble  each  other  so  much  that  one  could  almost  be 
lieve  they  were  of  one  family.  Their  women  are  plump  and 
pretty,  and  do  smile  upon  a  Christian  in  a  way  which  is  in  the 
last  degree  comforting. 

What  a  funny  old  town  it  is!  It  seems  like  profanation 
to  laugh  and  jest  and  bandy  the  frivolous  chat  of  our  day 
amid  its  hoary  relics.  Only  the  stately  phraseology  and  the 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  47 

measured  speech  of  the  sons  of  the  Prophet  are  suited  to  a 
venerable  antiquity  like  this.  Here  is  a  crumbling  wall  that 
was  old  when  Columbus  discovered  America ;  was  old  when 
Peter  the  Hermit  roused  the  knightly  men  of  the  Middle  Ages 
to  arm  for  the  first  Crusade;  was  old  when  Charlemagne 
and  his  paladins  beleaguered  enchanted  castles  and  battled  with 
giants  and  genii  in  the  fabled  days  of  the  olden  time;  was  old 
when  Christ  and  his  disciples  walked  the  earth;  stood  where 
it  stands  to-day  when  the  lips  of  Memnon  were  vocal,  and 
men  bought  and  sold  in  the  streets  of  ancient  Thebes ! 

The  Phoenecians,  the  Carthaginians,  the  English,  Moors, 
Romans,  all  have  battled  for  Tangier — all  have  won  it  and 
lost  it.  Here  is  a  ragged,  oriental  looking  negro  from 
some  desert  place  in  interior  Africa,  filling  his  goatskin 
with  water  from  a  stained  and  battered  fountain  built  by 
the  Romans  twelve  hundred  years  ago.  Yonder  is  a  ruined 
arch  of  a  bridge  built  by  Julius  Caesar  nineteen  hundred  years 
ago.  Men  who  had  seen  the  infant  Saviour  in  the  Virgin's 
arms  have  stood  upon  it,  maybe. 

Near  it  are  the  ruins  of  a  dockyard  where  Caesar  repaired 
his  ships  and  loaded  them  with  grain  when  he  invaded  Britain, 
fifty  years  before  the  Christian  era. 

Here  under  the  quiet  stars,  these  old  streets  seemed  thronged 
with  the  phantoms  of  forgotten  ages.  My  eyes  are  resting 
upon  a  spot  where  stood  a  monument  which  was  seen  and  de 
scribed  by  Roman  historians  less  than  two  thousand  years 
ago,  whereon  was  inscribed: 

"WE  ARE  THE  CANAANITES.     WE  ARE  THEY  THAT  HAVE 

BEEN  DRIVEN  OUT  OF  THE  LAND  OF  CANAAN  BY  THE  JEWISH 
ROBBER,  JOSHUA." 

Joshua  drove  them  out,  and  they  came  here.  Not  many 
leagues  from  here  is  a  tribe  of  Jews  whose  ancestors  fled 
thither  after  an  unsuccessful  revolt  against  King  David,  and 
these  their  descendants  are  still  under  a  ban  and  keep  to 
themselves. 

Tangier  has  been  mentioned  in  history  for  three  thousand 
years.  And  it  was  a  town,  though  a  queer  one,  when  Hercules, 
clad  in  his  lion-skin,  landed  here,  four  thousand  years  ago, 
In  these  streets  he  met  Anytus,  the  king  of  the  country,  and 
brained  him  with  his  club,  which  was  the  fashion  among 
gentlemen  in  those  days.  The  people  of  Tangier  (called 
Tingis,  then)  lived  in  the  rudest  possible  huts,  and  dressed 
in  skins  and  carried  clubs,  and  were  as  savage  as  the  wild 


48  MARK  TWAIN 

beasts  they  were  constantly  obliged  to  war  with.  But  they 
were  a  gentlemanly  race,  and  did  no  work.  They  lived  on 
the  natural  products  of  the  land.  Their  king's  country  res 
idence  was  at  the  famous  Garden  of  Hesperides,  seventy 
miles  down  the  coast  from  here.  The  garden,  with  its  golden 
apples  (oranges),  is  gone  now — no  vestige  of  it  remains. 
Antiquarians  concede  that  such  a  personage  as  Hercules  did 
exist  in  ancient  times,  and  agree  that  he  was  an  enterprising 
and  energetic  man,  but  decline  to  believe  him  a  good,  bona  fide 
god,  because  that  would  be  unconstitutional. 

Down  here  at  Cape  Spartel  is  the  celebrated  cave  of  Her 
cules,  where  that  hero  took  refuge  when  he  was  vanquished 
and  driven  out  of  the  Tangier  country.  It  is  full  of  in 
scriptions  in  the  dead  languages,  which  fact  makes  me  think 
Hercules  could  not  have  traveled  much,  else  he  would  not 
have  kept  a  journal. 

Five  days'  journey  from  here — say  two  hundred  miles — 
are  the  ruins  of  an  ancient  city,  of  whose  history  there  is 
neither  record  nor  tradition.  And  yet  its  arches,  its  columns, 
and  its  statues  proclaim  it  to  have  been  built  by  an  enlightened 
race. 

The  general  size  of  a  store  in  Tangier  is  about  that  of 
an  ordinary  shower-bath  in  a  civilized  land.  The  Moham 
medan  merchant,  tinman,  shoemaker,  or  vender  of  trifles  sits 
cross-legged  on  the  floor,  and  reaches  after  any  article  you 
may  want  to  buy.  You  can  rent  a  whole  block  of  these  pigeon 
holes  for  fifty  dollars  a  month.  The  market-people  crowd 
the  market-place  with  their  baskets  of  figs,  dates,  melons, 
apricots,  etc.,  and  among  them  file  trains  of  laden  asses,  not 
much  larger,  if  any,  than  a  Newfoundland  dog.  The  scene 
is  lively,  is  picturesque,  and  smells  like  a  police  court.  The 
Jewish  money-changers  have  their  dens  close  at  hand ;  and 
all  day  long  are  counting  bronze  coins  and  transferring  them 
from  one  bushel  basket  to  another.  They  don't  coin  much 
'money  nowadays,  I  think.  I  saw  none  but  what  was  dated 
four  or  five  hundred  years  back,  and  was  badly  worn  and 
battered.  These  coins  are  not  very  valuable.  Jack  went  out 
to  get  a  napoleon  changed,  so  as  to  have  money  suited  to  the 
general  cheapness  of  things,  and  came  back  and  said  he 
had  "swamped  the  bank;  had  bought  eleven  quarts  of  coin, 
and  the  head  of  the  firm  had  gone  on  the  street  to  negotiate 
for  the  balance  of  the  change."  I  bought  nearly  half  a  pint 
of  their  money  for  a  shilling  myself.  I  am  not  proud  on  ac- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  49 

count  of  having  so  much  money,  though.  I  care  nothing  for 
wealth.  The  Moors  have  some  small  silver  coins,  and  also 
some  silver  slugs  worth  a  dollar  each.  The  latter  are  exceed 
ingly  scarce — so  much  so  that  when  poor  ragged  Arabs  see  one 
they  beg  to  be  allowed  to  kiss  it. 

They  have  also  a  small  gold  coin  worth  two  dollars.  And 
that  reminds  me  of  something.  When  Morocco  is  in  a  state 
of  war,  Arab  couriers  carry  letters  through  the  country,  and 
charge  a  liberal  postage.  Every  now  and  then  they  fall  into 
the  hands  of  marauding  bands  and  get  robbed.  Therefore, 
warned  by  experience,  as  soon  as  they  have  collected  two 
dollars'  worth  of  money  they  exchange  it  for  one  of  those  little 
gold  pieces,  and  when  robbers  come  upon  them,  swallow  it. 
The  stratagem  was  good  while  it  was  unsuspected,  but  after 
that  the  marauders  simply  gave  the  sagacious  United  States 
mail  an  emetic  and  sat  down  to  wait. 

The  Emperor  of  Morocco  is  a  soulless  despot,  and  the 
great  officers  under  him  are  despots  on  a  smaller  scale.  There 
is  no  regular  system  of  taxation,  but  when  the  Emperor  or 
the  Bashaw  wants  money,  they  levy  on  some  rich  man,  and  he 
has  to  furnish  the  cash  or  go  to  prison.  Therefore,  few  men 
in  Morocco  dare  to  be  rich.  It  is  too  dangerous  a  luxury. 
Vanity  occasionally  leads  a  man  to  display  wealth,  but  sooner 
or  later  the  Emperor  trumps  up  a  charge  against  him — any 
sort  of  one  will  do — and  confiscates  his  property.  Of  course, 
there  are  many  rich  men  in  the  empire,  but  their  money  is 
buried,  and  they  dress  in  rags  and  counterfeit  poverty.  Every 
now  and  then  the  Emperor  imprisons  a  man  who  is  suspected 
of  the  crime  of  being  rich,  and  makes  things  so  uncomfortable 
for  him  that  he  is  forced  to  discover  where  he  has  hidden 
his  money. 

Moors  and  Jews  sometimes  place  themselves  under  the 
protection  of  the  foreign  consuls,  and  then  they  can  flout  their 
riches  in  the  Emperor's  face  with  impunity. 


CHAPTER  IX 

ABOUT  the  first  adventure  we  had  yesterday  afternoon, 
after  landing  here,  came  near  finishing  that  heedless 
Blucher.  We  had  just  mounted  some  mules  and 
asses,  and  started  out  under  the  guardianship  of  the 
stately,  the  princely,  the  magnificent  Hadji  Mohammed 
Lamarty  (may  his  tribe  increase!),  when  we  came  upon  a 
fine  Moorish  mosque,  with  tall  tower,  rich  with  checker-work 
of  many-colored  porcelain,  and  every  part  and  portion  of  the 
edifice  adorned  with  the  quaint  architecture  of  the  Alhambra, 
and  Blucher  started  to  ride  into  the  open  doorway.  A  startling 
"Hi-hi !"  from  our  camp  followers,  and  a  loud  "Halt !"  from 
an  English  gentleman  in  the  party,  checked  the  adventurer, 
and  then  we  were  informed  that  so  dire  a  profanation  is  it 
for  a  Christian  dog  to  set  foot  upon  the  sacred  threshold  of 
a  Moorish  mosque,  that  no  amount  of  purification  can  ever 
make  it  fit  for  the  faithful  to  pray  in  again.  Had  Blucher 
succeeded  in  entering  the  place,  he  would  no  doubt  have  been 
chased  through  the  town  and  stoned ;  and  the  time  has  been, 
and  not  many  years  ago  either,  when  a  Christian  would  have 
been  most  ruthlessly  slaughtered,  if  captured  in  a  mosque. 
We  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  handsome  tessellated  pavements 
within,  and  of  the  devotees  performing  their  ablutions  at  the 
fountains ;  but  even  that  we  took  that  glimpse  was  a  thing 
not  relished  by  the  Moorish  bystanders. 

Some  years  ago  the  clock  in  the  tower  of  the  mosque  got 
out  of  order.  The  Moors  of  Tangier  have  so  degenerated 
that  it  has  been  long  since  there  was  an  artificer  among  them 
capable  of  curing  so  delicate  a  patient  as  a  debilitated  clock. 
The  great  men  of  the  city  met  in  solemn  conclave  to  con 
sider  how  the  difficulty  was  to  be  met.  They  discussed  the 
matter  thoroughly  but  arrived  at  no  solution.  Finally,  a 
patriarch  arose  and  said : 

"Oh,  children  of  the  Prophet,  it  is  known  unto  you  that 
a  Portuguee  dog  of  a  Christian  clockmender  pollutes  the  city 
of  Tangier  with  his  presence.  Ye  know,  also,  that  when 
mosques  are  builded,  asses  bear  the  stones  and  the  cement,  and 

50 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  51 

cross  the  sacred  threshold.  Now,  therefore,  send  the  Christian 
dog  on  all  fours,  and  barefoot,  into  the  holy  place  to  mend 
the  clock,  and  let  him  go  as  an  ass !" 

And  in  that  way  it  was  done.  Therefore,  if  Blucher 
ever  sees  the  inside  of  a  mosque,  he  will  have  to  cast  aside 
his  humanity  and  go  in  his  natural  character.  We  visited  the 
jail,  and  found  Moorish  prisoners  making  mats  and  baskets. 
(This  thing  of  utilizing  crime  savors  of  civilization.)  Murder 
is  punished  with  death.  A  short  time  ago  three  murderers 
were  taken  beyond  the  city  walls  and  shot.  Moorish  guns 
are  not  good,  and  neither  are  Moorish  marksmen.  In  this 
instance,  they  set  up  the  poor  criminals  at  long  range,  like  so 
many  targets,  and  practised  on  them — kept  them  hopping 
about  and  dodging  bullets  for  half  an  hour  before  they  man 
aged  to  drive  the  center. 

When  a  man  steals  cattle,  they  cut  off  his  right  hand 
:and  left  leg,  and  nail  them  up  in  the  market-place  as  a  warn 
ing  to  everybody.  Their  surgery  is  not  artistic.  They  slice 
around  the  bone  a  little;  then  break  off  the  limb.  Some 
times  the  patient  gets  well;  but,  as  a  general  thing,  he  don't. 
However,  the  Moorish  heart  is  stout.  The  Moors  were  always 
brave.  These  criminals  undergo  the  fearful  operation  with 
out  a  wince,  without  a  tremor  of  any  kind,  without 
a  groan!  No  amount  of  suffering  can  bring  down  the 
pride  of  a  Moor,  or  make  him  shame  his  dignity  with  a  cry. 

Here,  marriage  is  contracted  by  the  parents  of  the  parties 
to  it.  There  are  no  valentines,  no  stolen  interviews,  no  rid 
ing  out,  no  courting  in  dim  parlors,  no  lovers'  quarrels  and 
reconciliations — no  nothing  that  is  proper  to  approaching 
matrimony.  The  young  man  takes  the  girl  his  father  selects 
for  him,  marries  her,  and  after  that  she  is  unveiled,  and  he 
sees  her  for  the  first  time.  If,  after  due  acquaintance,  she 
suits  him,  he  retains  her ;  but  if  he  suspects  her  purity,  he 
bundles  her  back  to  her  father;  if  he  finds  her  diseased,  the 
same ;  or  if,  after  just  and  reasonable  time  is  allowed  her, 
she  neglects  to  bear  children,  back  she  goes  to  the  home  of 
her  childhood. 

Mohammedans  here,  who  can  afford  it,  keep  a  good  many 
wives  on  hand.  They  are  called  wives,  though  I  believe  the 
Koran  only  allows  four  genuine  wives — the  rest  are  concu 
bines.  The  Emperor  of  Morocco  don't  know  how  many  wives 
he  has,  but  thinks  he  has  five  hundred.  However,  that  is  near 
enough — a  dozen  or  so,  one  way  or  the  other,  don't  matter. 


52  MARK  TWAIN 

Even  the  Jews  in  the  interior  have  a  plurality  of  wives. 

I  have  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  faces  of  several  Moorish 
women  (for  they  are  only  human,  and  will  expose  their 
faces  for  the  admiration  of  a  Christian  dog  when  no  male  Moor 
is  by),  and  I  am  full  of  veneration  for  the  wisdom  that  leads 
them  to  cover  up  such  atrocious  ugliness. 

They  carry  their  children  at  their  backs,  in  a  sack,  like 
other  savages  the  world  over. 

Many  of  the  negroes  are  held  in  slavery  by  the  Moors. 
But  the  moment  a  female  slave  becomes  her  master's  concu 
bine  her  bonds  are  broken,  and  as  soon  as  a  male  slave  can 
read  the  first  chapter  of  the  Koran  (which  contains  the 
creed)  he  can  no  longer  be  held  in  bondage. 

They  have  three  Sundays  a  week  in  Tangier.  The  Moham 
medan's  comes  on  Friday,  the  Jew's  on  Saturday,  and  that 
of  the  Christian  Consuls  on  Sunday.  The  Jews  are  the  most 
radical.  The  Moor  goes  to  his  mosque  about  noon  on  his 
Sabbath,  as  on  any  other  day,  removes  his  shoes  at  the  door, 
performs  his  ablutions,  makes  his  salaams,  pressing  his  fore 
head  to  the  pavement  time  and  again,  says  this  prayers,  and 
goes  back  to  his  work. 

But  the  Jew  shuts  up  shop ;  will  not  touch  copper  or  bronze 
money  at  all ;  soils  his  fingers  with  nothing  meaner  than  silver 
and  gold ;  attends  the  synagogue  devoutly ;  will  not  cook  or 
have  anything  to  do  with  fire;  and  religiously  refrains  from 
embarking  in  any  enterprise. 

The  Moor  who  has  made  a  pilgrimage  to  Mecca  is  en 
titled  to  high  distinction.  Men  call  him  Hadji,  and  he  is 
thenceforward  a  great  personage.  Hundreds  of  Moors  come 
to  Tangier  every  year,  and  embark  for  Mecca.  They  go  part 
of  the  way  in  English  steamers ;  and  the  ten  or  twelve  dollars 
they  pay  for  passage  is  about  all  the  trip  costs.  They  take 
with  them  a  quantity  of  fo6d,  and  when  the  commissary  de 
partment  fails  they  "skirmish,"  as  Jack  terms  it  in  his  sinful, 
slangy  way.  From  the  time  they  leave  till  they  get  home  again, 
they  never  wash,  either  on  land  or  sea.  They  are  usually 
gone  from  five  to  seven  months,  and  as  they  do  not  change 
their  clothes  during  all  that  time,  they  are  totally  unfit  for 
the  drawing-room  when  they  get  back. 

Many  of  them  have  to  rake  and  scrape  a  long  time  to 
gather  together  the  ten  dollars  their  steamer  passage  costs ;  and 
when  one  of  them  gets  back  he  is  a  bankrupt  forever  after. 
Few  Moors  can  ever  build  vtp  their  fortunes  in  one  short  life- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  53 

time,  after  so  reckless  an  outlay.  In  order  to  confine  the 
dignity  of  Hadji  to  gentlemen  of  patrician  blood  and  pos 
sessions,  the  Emperor  decreed  that  no  man  should  make  the 
pilgrimage  save  bloated  aristocrats  who  were  worth  a  hundred 
dollars  in  specie.  But  behold  how  iniquity  can  circumvent  the 
law!  For  a  consideration,  the  Jewish  money-changer  lends 
the  pilgrim  one  hundred  dollars  long  enough  for  him  to  swear 
himself  through,  and  then  receives  it  back  before  the  ship 
sails  out  of  the  harbor! 

Spain  is  the  only  nation  the  Moors  fear.  The  reason  is, 
that  Spain  sends  her  heaviest  ships  of  war  and  her  loudest 
guns  to  astonish  these  Moslems;  while  America,  and  other 
nations,  send  only  a  little  contemptible  tub  of  a  gunboat  oc 
casionally.  The  Moors,  like  other  savages,  learn  by  what  they 
see;  not  what  they  hear  or  read.  We  have  great  fleets  in  the 
Mediterranean,  but  they  seldom  touch  at  African  ports.  The 
Moors  have  a  small  opinion  of  England,  France,  and  Amer 
ica,  and  put  their  representatives  to  a  deal  of  red-tape  circum 
locution  before  they  grant  them  their  common  rights,  let  alone 
a  favor.  But  the  moment  the  Spanish  minister  makes  a  de 
mand,  it  is  acceded  to  at  once,  whether  it  be  just  or  not. 

Spain  chastised  the  Moors  five  or  six  years  ago,  about  a 
disputed  piece  of  property  opposite  Gibraltar,  and  captured 
the  city  of  Tetouan.  She  compromised  on  an  augmentation 
of  her  territory;  twenty  million  dollars  indemnity  in  money; 
and  peace.  And  then  she  gave  up  the  city.  But  she  never 
gave  it  up  until  the  Spanish  soldiers  had  eaten  up  all  the  cats. 
They  would  not  compromise  as  long  as  the  cats  held  out. 
Spaniards  are  very  fond  of  cats.  On  the  contrary,  the  Moors 
reverence  cats  as  something  sacred.  So  the  Spaniards  touched 
them  on  a  tender  point  that  time.  Their  unfeline  conduct 
in  eating  up  all  the  Tetouan  cats  aroused  a  hatred  toward 
them  in  the  breasts  of  the  Moors,  to  which  even  the  driving 
them  out  of  Spain  was  tame  and  passionless.  Moors  and 
Spaniards  are  foes  forever  now.  France  had  a  minister  here 
once  who  embittered  the  nation  against  him  in  the  most  inno 
cent  way.  He  killed  a  couple  of  battalions  of  cats  (Tangier 
is  full  of  them)  and  made  a  parlor  carpet  out  of  their  hides. 
He  made  his  carpet  in  circles — first  a  circle  of  old  gray  tom 
cats,  with  their  tails  all  pointing  toward  the  center ;  then  a 
circle  of  yellow  cats;  next  a  circle  ol  black  cats  and  a  circle 
of  white  ones ;  then  a  circle  of  all  sorts  of  cats ;  and,  finally, 


54  MARK  TWAIN 

a  centerpiece  of  assorted  kittens.  It  was  very  beautiful;  but 
the  Moors  curse  his  memory  to  this  day. 

When  we  went  to  call  on  our  American  Consul-General, 
to-day,  I  noticed  that  all  possible  games  for  parlor  amusement 
seemed  to  be  represented  on  his  center-tables.  I  thought 
that  hinted  of  lonesomeness.  The  idea  was  correct.  His 
is  the  only  American  family  in  Tangier.  There  are 
many  foreign  consuls  in  this  place;  but  much  visiting  is  not 
indulged  in.  Tangier  is  clear  out  of  the  world,  and  what  is  the 
use  of  visiting  when  people  have  nothing  on  earth  to  talk 
about?  There  is  none.  So  each  consul's  family  stays  at  home 
chiefly,  and  amuses  itself  as  best  it  can.  Tangier  is  full  of 
interest  for  one  day,  but  after  that  it  is  a  weary  prison. 
The  Consul-General  has  been  five  years  and  has  got  enough 
of  it  to  do  him  for  a  century,  and  is  going  home  shortly.  His 
family  seize  upon  their  letters  and  papers  when  the  mail  arrives, 
read  them  over  and  over  again  for  two  days  or  three,  talk  them 
over  and  over  again  for  two  or  three  more,  till  they  wear 
them  out,  and  after  that,  for  days  together,  they  eat  and  drink 
and  sleep,  and  ride  out  over  the  same  old  road,  and  see  the 
^ame  old  tiresome  things  that  even  decades  of  centuries  have 
scarcely  changed,  and  say  never  a  single  word !  They  have 
literally  nothing  whatever  to  talk  about.  The  arrival  of  an 
American  man-of-war  is  a  godsend  to  them.  "Oh,  solitude, 
where  are  the  charms  which  sages  have  seen  in  thy  face?" 
It  is  the  completest  exile  that  I  can  conceive  of.  I  would 
seriously  recommend  to  the  government  of  the  United  States 
that  when  a  man  commits  a  crime  so  heinous  that  the  law 
provides  no  adequate  punishment  for  it,  they  make  him  Consul- 
General  to  Tangier. 

I  am  glad  to  have  seen  Tangier — the  second  oldest  town  in 
the  world.  But  I  am  ready  to  bid  it  good-by,  I  believe. 

Wre  shall  go  hence  to  Gibraltar  this  evening  or  in  the  morning  ; 
and  doubtless  the  Quaker  City  will  sail  from  that  port  within 
the  next  forty-eight  hours. 


CHAPTER  X 

WE  passed  the  Fourth  of  July  on  board  the  Quaker  City, 
in  mid-ocean.  It  was  in  all  respects  a  characteristic 
Mediterranean  day — faultlessly  beautiful.  A  cloud 
less  sky;  a  refreshing  summer  wind;  a  radiant  sunshine  that 
glinted  cheerily  from  dancing  wavelets  instead  of  crested  moun 
tains  of  water ;  a  sea  beneath  us  that  was  so  wonderfully  blue, 
so  richly,  brilliantly  blue,  that  it  overcame  the  dullest  sensibili 
ties  with  the  spell  of  its  fascination. 

They  even  have  fine  sunsets  on  the  Mediterranean — a  thing 
that  is  certainly  rare  in  most  quarters  of  the  globe.  The  even 
ing  we  sailed  away  from  Gibraltar,  that  hard-featured  rock 
was  swimming  in  a  creamy  mist  so  rich,  so  soft,  so  enchant- 
ingly  vague  and  dreamy,  that  even  the  Oracle,  that  serene, 
that  inspired,  that  overpowering  humbug,  scorned  the  dinner- 
gong  and  tarried  to  worship! 

He  said:  "Well,  that's  gorgis,  ain't  it!  They  don't  have 
none  of  them  things  in  our  parts,  do  they?  I  consider  that 
them  effects  is  on  account  of  the  superior  refragability,  as  you 
may  say,  of  the  sun's  diramic  combination  with  the  lymphatic 
forces  of  the  perihelion  of  Jubiter.  What  should  you  think?" 

"Oh,  go  to  bed !"     Dan  said  that,  and  went  away. 

"Oh,  yes,  it's  all  very  well  to  say  go  to  bed  when  a  man 
makes  an  argument  which  another  man  can't  answer.  Dan 
don't  never  stand  any  chance  in  an  argument  with  me.  And 
he  knows  it,  too.  What  should  you  say,  Jack?" 

"Now,  doctor,  don't  you  come  bothering  around  me  with 
that  dictionary  bosh.  I  don't  do  you  any  harm,  do  I?  Then 
you  let  me  alone." 

"He's  gone,  too.  Well,  the  fellows  have  all  tackled  the  old 
Oracle,  as  they  say,  but  the  old  man's  most  too  many  for  'em. 
Maybe  the  Poet  Lariat  ain't  satisfied  with  them  deductions?" 

The  poet  replied  with  a  barbarous  rhyme,  and  went  below. 

"'Pears  that  he  can't  qualify,  neither.  Well,  I  didn't  expect 
nothing  out  of  him.  I  never  see  one  of  them  poets  yet  that 
knowed  anything.  He'll  go  down,  now,  and  grind  out  about 
four  reams  of  the  awfullest  slush  about  that  old  rock,  and 

55 


56  MARK  TWAIN 

give  it  to  a  consul  or  a  pilot  or  a  nigger,  or  anybody  he  comes 
across  first  which  he  can  impose  on.  Pity  but  somebody'd  take 
that  poor  old  lunatic  and  dig  all  that  poetry  rubbage  out  of  him. 
Why  can't  a  man  put  his  intellect  onto  things  that's  some 
value?  Gibbons  and  Hippocratus  and  Sarcophagus,  and 
all  them  old  ancient  philosophers,  was  down  on  poets — •" 

"Doctor,"  I  said,  "you  are  going  to  invent  authorities  now, 
and  I'll  leave  you,  too.  I  always  enjoy  your  conversation, 
notwithstanding  the  luxuriance  of  your  syllables,  when  the 
philosophy  you  offer  rests  on  your  own  responsibility;  but 
when  you  begin  to  soar — when  you  begin  to  support  it  with  the 
evidence  of  authorities  who  are  the  creations  of  your  own 
fancy,  I  lose  confidence/' 

That  was  the  way  to  flatter  the  doctor.  He  considered  it  a 
sort  of  acknowledgment  on  my  part  of  a  fear  to  argue  with 
him.  He  was  always  persecuting  the  passengers  with  abstruse 
propositions  framed  in  language  that  no  man  could  understand, 
and  they  endured  the  exquisite  torture  a  minute  or  two  and 
then  abandoned  the  field.  A  triumph  like  this,  over  half  a 
dozen  antagonists,  wa,s  sufficient  for  one  day;  from  that  time 
forward  he  would  patrol  the  decks  beaming  blandly  upon 
all  comers,  and  so  tranquilly,  blissfully  happy ! 

But  I  digress.  The  thunder  of  our  two  brave  cannon  an 
nounced  the  Fourth  of  July,  at  daylight  to  all  who  were  awake. 
But  many  of  us  got  our  information  at  a  later  hour,  from  the 
almanac.  All  the  flags  were  sent  aloft,  except  half  a  dozen  that 
were  needed  to  decorate  portions  of  the  ship  below,  and  in  a 
short  time  the  vessel  assumed  a  holiday  appearance.  During 
the  morning,  meetings  were  held  and  all  manner  of  committees 
set  to  work  on  the  celebration  ceremonies.  In  the  afternoon 
the  ship's  company  assembled  aft,  on  deck,  under  the  awnings ; 
the  flute,  the  asthmatic  melodeon,  and  the  consumptive  clarinet,^ 
crippled  the  "Star-Spangled  Banner,"  the  choir  chased  it  to 
cover,  and  George  came  in  with  a  peculiarly  lacerating  screech 
on  the  final  note  and  slaughtered  it.  Nobody  mourned. 

We  carried  out  the  corpse  on  three  cheers  (that  joke  was  not 
intentional  and  I  do  not  indorse  it),  and  then  the  President, 
throned  behind  a  cable-locker  with  a  national  flag  spread  over 
it,  announced  the  "Reader,"  who  rose  up  and  read  that  same 
old  Declaration  of  Independence  which  we  have  all  listened  to 
so  often  without  paying  any  attention  to  what  it  said ;  and  after 
that  the  President  piped  the  Orator  of  the  Day  to  quarters  and 
he  made  that  same  old  speech  about  our  national  greatness 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  57 

which  we  so  religiously  believe  and  so  fervently  applaud. 
Now  came  the  choir  into  court  again,  with  the  complaining 
instruments,  and  assaulted  "Hail  Columbia ;"  and  when  victory 
hung  wavering  in  the  scale,  George  returned  with  his  dread 
ful  wild-goose  stop  turned  on,  and  the  choir  won,  of  course. 
A  minister  pronounced  the  benediction,  and  the  patriotic  little 
gathering  disbanded.  The  Fourth  of  July  was  safe,  as  far 
as  the  Mediterranean  was  concerned. 

At  dinner  in  the  evening,  a  well-written  original  poem  was 
recited  with  spirit  by  one  of  the  ship's  captains,  and  thirteen 
regular  toasts  were  washed  down  with  several  baskets  of  cham 
pagne.  The  speeches  were  bad — execrable,  almost  without 
exception.  In  fact,  without  any  exceptions,  but  one.  Captain 
Duncan  made  a  good  speech ;  he  made  the  only  good  speech 
of  the  evening.  He  said : 

"LADIES  AND  GENTLEMEN  : — May  we  all  live  to  a  green  old 
age,  and  be  prosperous  and  happy.  Steward,  bring  up  another 
basket  of  champagne." 

It  was  regarded  as  a  very  able  effort. 

The  festivities,  so  to  speak,  closed  with  another  of  those 
miraculous  balls  on  the  promenade  deck.  We  were  not  used 
to  dancing  on  an  even  keel,  though,  and  it  was  only  a  question 
able  success.  But  take  it  altogether,  it  was  a  bright,  cheerful, 
pleasant  Fourth. 

Toward  nightfall,  the  next  evening,  we  steamed  into  the 

great  artificial  harbor  of   this   noble  city  of   Marseilles,   and 

saw  the  dying  sunlight  gild  its  clustering  spires  and  ramparts, 

and  flood   its  leagues   of   environing  verdure   with  a  mellow 

i  radiance  that  touched  with  an  added  charm  the  white  villas 

I  that  flecked  the  landscape  far  and  near.     [Copyright  secured 

according  to   law.] 

There  were  no  stages  out,  and  we  could  not  get  on  the  pier 
|  from  the  ship.     It  was  annoying.    We  were  full  of  enthusiam 
;  — we  wanted  to  see  France!     Just  at  nightfall  our  party  of 
;  three  contracted  with  a  waterman  for  the  privilege  of  using 
!  his  boat  as  a  bridge — its  stern  was  at  our  companion-ladder 
and  its  bow  touched  the  pier.    We  got  in  and  the  fellow  backed 
out  into  the  harbor.     I  told  him  in  French  that  all  we  wanted 
was  to  walk  over  his  thwarts  and  step  ashore,  and  asked  him 
what  he  went  away  out  there  for  ?    He  said  he  could  not  under 
stand  me.     I  repeated.     Still,  he  could  not  understand.     He 
appeared  to  be  very  ignorant  of   French.     The  doctor  tried 
him,  but  he  could  not  understand  the  doctor.     I  asked  this 


58  MARK  TWAIN 

boatman  to  explain  his  conduct,  which  he   did ;  and  then  I 
couldn't  understand  him.     Dan  said: 

"Oh,  go  to  the  pier,  you  old  fool — that's  where  we  want 
to  go !" 

We  reasoned  calmly  with  Dan  that  it  was  useless  to  speak 
to  this  foreigner  in  English — that  he  had  better  let  us  conduct 
this  business  in  the  French  language  and  not  let  the  stranger 
see  how  uncultivated  he  was. 

"Well,  go  on,  go  on,"  he  said,  "don't  mind  me.  I  don't 
wish  to  interfere.  Only,  if  you  go  on  telling  him  in  your  kind 
of  French  he  never  will  find  out  where  we  want  to  go  to. 
That  is  what  I  think  about  it." 

We  rebuked  him  severely  for  this  remark,  and  said  we 
never  knew  an  ignorant  person  yet  but  was  prejudiced.  The 
Frenchman  spoke  again,  and  the  doctor  said : 

"There,  now,  Dan,  he  says  he  is  going  to  dies  to  the  douain, 
Means  he  is  going  to  the  hotel.  Oh,  certainly —  we  don't  know 
the  French  language." 

This  was  a  crusher,  as  Jack  would  say.  It  silenced  further 
criticism  from  the  disaffected  member.  We  coasted  past  the 
sharp  bows  of  a  navy  of  great  steamships,  and  stopped  at 
last  at  a  government  building  on  a  stone  pier.  It  was  easy  to 
remember  then  that  the  douain  was  the  custom-house,  and  not 
the  hotel.  We  did  not  mention  it,  however.  With  winning- 
French  politeness,  the  officers  merely  opened  and  closed  our 
satchels,  declined  to  examine  our  passports  and  sent  us  on 
our  way.  We  stopped  at  the  first  cafe  we  came  to,  and 
entered.  An  old  woman  seated  us  at  a  table  and  waited  for 
orders.  The  doctor  said: 

"Avez-vous-du-vin !" 

The  dame  looked  perplexed.  The  doctor  said  again,  with 
elaborate  distinctness  of  articulation: 

"Avez-vous-du-vin !" 

The  dame  looked  more  perplexed  than  before.     I  said : 

"Doctor,  there  is  a  flaw  in  your  pronunciation  somewhere. 
Let  me  try  her.  Madame,  avez-vous  du  vin  ?  It  isn't  any  use, 
doctor — take  the  witness." 

"Madame,  avez-vous  du  vin — ou  fromage — pain — pickled 
pigs'  feet — beurre — des  cefs — du  beuf — horseradish,  sauer 
kraut,  hog  and  hominy-^anything,  anything  in  the  world  that 
can  stay  a  Christian  stomach!" 

She  said: 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  59 

"Bless  you,  why  didn't  you  speak  English  before? — I  don't 
know  anything  about  your  plagued  French !" 

The  humiliating  taunts  of  the  disaffected  member  spoiled  the 
supper,  and  we  despatched  it  in  angry  silence  and  got  away 
as  soon  as  we  could.  Here  we  were  in  beautiful  France — in 
a  vast  stone  house  of  quaint  architecture — surrounded  by  all 
manner  of  curiously  worded  French  signs — stared  at  by 
strangely  habited,  bearded  French  people — everything  grad 
ually  and  surely  forcing  upon  us  the  coveted  consciousness  that 
at  last,  and  beyond  all  question,  we  were  in  beautiful  France 
and  absorbing  its  nature  to  the  forgetfulness  of  everything 
else,  and  coming  to  feel  the  happy  romance  of  the  thing  in 
all  its  enchanting  delightfulness — and  to  think  of  this  skinny 
veteran  intruding  with  her  vile  English,  at  such  a  moment,  to 
blow  the  fair  vision  to  the  winds  !  It  was  exasperating. 

We  set  out  to  find  the  center  of  the  city,  inquiring  the  direc 
tion  every  now  and  then.  We  never  did  succeed  in  making 
anybody  understand  just  exactly  what  we  wanted,  and  neither 
did  we  ever  succeed  in  comprehending  just  exactly  what  they 
said  in  reply — but  then  they  always  pointed — they  always  did 
that,  and  we  bowed  politely  and  said  "Merci,  Monsieur,"  and 
so  it  was  a  blighting  triumph  over  the  disaffected  member, 
anyway.  He  was  restive  under  these  victories  and  often  asked : 

"What  did  that  pirate  say?'" 

"Why,  he  told  us  which  way  to  go,  to  find  the  Grand  Casino." 

"Yes,  but  what  did  he  say?" 

"Oh,  it  don't  matter  what  he  said — we  understood  him. 
These  are  educated  people — not  like  that  absurd  boatman." 

"Well,  I  wish  they  were  educated  enough  to  tell  a  man  a 
direction  that  goes  somewhere — for  we've  been  going  around 
in  a  circle  for  an  hour — I've  passed  this  same  old  drug  store 
seven  times." 

We  said  it  was  a  low,  disreputable  falsehood  (but  we  knew 
it  was  not).  It  was  plain  that  it  would  not  do  to  pass  that 
drug  store  again,  though — we  might  go  on  asking  directions, 
but  we  must  cease  from  following  finger-pointings  if  we  hoped 
to  check  the  suspicions  of  the  disaffected  member. 

A  long  walk  through  smooth,  asphaltum-paved  streets, 
bordered  by  blocks  of  vast  new  mercantile  houses  of  cream- 
colored  stone, — every  house  and  every  block  precisely  like  all 
the  other  houses  and  all  the  other  blocks  for  a  mile,  and  all 
brilliantly  lighted, — brought  us  at  last  to  the  principal  thorough 
fare.  On  every  hand  were  bright  colors,  flashing  constella- 


60  MARK  TWAIN 

tions  of  gas-burners,  gaily  dressed  men  and  women  thronging 
the  sidewalks — hurry,  life,  activity,  cheerfulness,  conversa 
tion,  and  laughter  everywhere !  We  found  the  Grand  Hotel  du 
Louvre  et  de  la  Paix,  and  wrote  down  who  we  were,  where 
we  were  born,  what  our  occupations  were,  the  place  we  came 
from  last,  whether  we  were  married  or  single,  how  we  liked 
it,  how  old  we  were,  where  we  were  bound  for  and  when  we 
expected  to  get  there,  and  a  great  deal  of  information  of 
similar  importance — all  for  the  benefit  of  the  landlord  and  the 
secret  police.  We  hired  a  guide  and  began  the  business  of 
sight-seeing  immediately.  That  first  night  on  French  soil  was 
a  stirring  one.  I  cannot  think  of  half  the  places  we  went  to, 
or  what  we  particularly  saw ;  we  had  no  disposition  to  examine 
carefully  into  anything  at  all — we  only  wanted  to  glance  and  go 
— to  move,  keep  moving !  The  spirit  of  the  country  was  upon 
us.  We  sat  down,  finally,  at  a  late  hour,  in  the  great  Casino, 
and  called  for  unstinted  champagne.  It  is  so  easy  to  be 
bloated  aristocrats  where  it  costs  nothing  of  consequence  • 
There  were  about  five  hundred  people  in  that  dazzling  place,  1 
suppose,  though  the  walls  being  papered  entirely  with  mirrors, 
so  to  speak,  one  could  not  really  tell  but  that  there  were  a  hun 
dred  thousand.  Young,  daintily  dressed  exquisite  and  young, 
stylishly  dressed  women,  and  also  old  gentlemen  and  old  ladies, 
sat  in  couples  and  groups  about  innumerable  marble-topped 
tables,  and  ate  fancy  suppers,  drank  wine,  and  kept  up  a  chat 
tering  din  of  conversation  that  was  dazing  to  the  senses.  There 
was  a  stage  at  the  far  end,  and  a  large  orchestra;  and  every 
now  and  then  actors  and  actresses  in  preposterous  comic 
dresses  came  out  and  sang  the  most  extravagantly  funny  songs, 
to  judge  by  their  absurd  actions ;  but  that  audience  merely  sus 
pended  its  chatter,  stared  cynically,  and  never  once  smiled^ 
never  once  applauded !  I  had  always  thought  that  Frenchmen 
were  ready  to  laugh  at  anything. 


CHAPTER  XI 

WE  are  getting  foreignized  rapidly,  and  with  facility. 
We  are  getting  reconciled  to  halls  and  bed-chambers 
with  unhomelike  stone  floors,  and  no  carpets — floors 
that  ring  to  the  tread  of  one's  heels  with  a  sharpness  that  is 
death  to  sentimental  musing.  We  are  getting  used  to  tidy, 
noiseless  waiters,  who  glide  hither  and  thither,  and  hover 
about  your  back  and  your  elbows  like  butterflies,  quick  to  com 
prehend  orders,  quick  to  fill  them;  thankful  for  a  gratuity 
without  regard  to  the  amount;  and  always  polite — never  other 
wise  than  polite.  That  is  the  strangest  curiosity  yet — a  really 
polite  hotel  waiter  who  isn't  an  idiot.  We  are  getting  used 
to  driving  right  into  the  central  court  of  the  hotel,  in  the  midst 
of  a  fragrant  circle  of  vines  and  flowers,  and  in  the  midst, 
also,  of  parties  of  gentlemen  sitting  quietly  reading  the  paper 
and  smoking.  We  are  getting  used  to  ice  frozen  by  artificial 
process  in  ordinary  bottles — the  only  kind  of  ice  they  have 
here.  We  are  getting  used  to  all  these  things ;  but  we  are  not 
getting  used  to  carrying  our  own  soap.  We  are  sufficiently 
civilized  to  carry  our  own  combs  and  tooth-brushes;  but  this 
thing  of  having  to  ring  for  soap  every  time  we  wash  is  new  to 
us,  and  not  pleasant  at  all.  We  think  of  it  just  after  we  get 
our  heads  and  faces  thoroughly  wet,  or  just  when  we  tmnk 
we  have  been  in  the  bath-tub  long  enough,  and  then,  of  course, 
an  annoying  delay  follows.  These  Marseillaise  make  Mar 
seillaise  hymns,  and  Marseilles  vests,  and  Marseilles  soap  for 
all  the  world;  but  they  never  sing  their  hymns,  or  wear  their 
vests,  or  wash  with  their  soap  themselves. 

We  have  learned  to  go  through  the  lingering  routine  of  the 
table  d'hote  with  patience,  with  serenity,  with  satisfaction.  We 
take  soup ;  then  wait  a  few  minutes  for  the  fish ;  a  few  minutes 
more  and  the  plates  are  changed,  and  the  roast  beef  comes; 
another  change  and  we  take  peas ;  change  again  and  take  lentils ; 
change  and  take  snail  patties  (I  prefer  grasshoppers)  ;  change 
and  take  roast  chicken  and  salad ;  then  strawberry  pie  and  ice 
cream;  then  green  figs,  pears,  oranges,  green  almonds,  etc., 

61 


\\ 
\  | 
'• 


62  MARK  TWAIN 

finally  coffee.  Wine  with  every  course,  of  course,  being  in 
France.  With  such  a  cargo  on  board,  digestion  is  a  slow  pro 
cess,  and  we  must  sit  long  in  the  cool  chambers  and  smoke  — 
and  read  French  newspapers,  which  have  a  strange  fashion  of 
telling  a  perfectly  straight  story  till  you  get  to  the  "nub"  of  it, 
and  then  a  word  drops  in  that  no  man  can  translate,  and  that 
story  is  ruined.  An  embankment  fell  on  some  Frenchmen 
yesterday,  and  the  papers  are  full  of  it  today  —  but  whether 
those  sufferers  were  killed,  or  crippled,  or  bruised,  or  only 
scared,  is  more  than  I  can  possibly  make  out,  and  yet  I  would 
just  give  anything  to  know. 

fWe  were  troubled  a  little  at  dinner  to-day,  by  the  conduct  of 
an  American,  who  talked  very  loudly  and  coarsely,  and  laughed 
boisterously  where  all  others  were  so  quiet  and  well  behaved/ 
He  ordered  wine  with  a  royal  flourish,  and  said  :  "I  never  dine 
without  wine,  sir"  (which  was  a  pitiful  falsehood),  and  looked 
around  upon  the  company  to  bask  in  the  admiration  he  ex 
pected  to  find  in  their  faces.  All  these  airs  in  a  land  where 
they  would  as  soon  expect  to  leave  the  soup  out  of  the  bill  of 
fare  as  the  wine  !  —  in  a  land  where  wine  is  nearly  as  common 
among  all  ranks  as  water!  This  fellow  said:  "I  am  a  free- 
born  sovereign,  sir,  an  American,  sir,  and  I  want  everybody  to 
know  it  !"  He  did  not  mention  that  he  was  a  lineal  descendant 
of  Balaam's  ass;  but  everybody  knew  that  without  his  telling 
it. 

We  have  driven  in  the  Prado  —  that  superb  avenue  bordered 
with  (patrician  mansions  and  noble  shade  trees  —  and  have 
visited  the  Chateau  Borely  and  its  curious  museum.  They 
showed  us  a  miniature  cemetery  there-  —  a  copy  of  the  first 
graveyard  that  was  ever  in  Marseilles,  no  doubt.  The  delicate 
little  skeletons  were  lying  in  broken  vaults,  and  had  their, 
household  gods  and  kitchen  utensils  with  them.  The  original 
of  this  cemetery  was  dug  up  in  the  principal  street  of  the  city 
a  few  years  ago.  It  had  remained  there,  only  twelve  feet  under 
ground,  for  a  matter  of  twenty-five  hundred  years,  or  there 
abouts.  Romulus  was  here  before  he  built  Rome,  and  thought 
something  of  founding  a  city  on  this  spot,  but  gave  up  the  idea, 
He  may  have  been  personally  acquainted  with  some  of  these 
Phoenicians  whose  skeletons  we  have  been  examining. 

In  the  great  Zoological  Gardens  we  found  specimens  of  all 
the  animals  the  world  produces,  I  think,  including  a  dromedary, 
a  monkey  ornamented  with  tufts  of  brilliant  blue  and  carmine 
hair  —  a  very  gorgeous  monkey  he  was  —  a  hippopotamus  from 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  63 

the  Nile,  and  a  sort  of  tall,  long-legged  bird  with  a  beak  like  a 
powder-horn,  and  close-fitting  wings  like  the  tails  of  a  dress- 
coat.  This  fellow  stood  up  with  his  eyes  shut  and  his  shoulders 
stooped  forward  a  little,  and  looked  as  if  he  had  his  hands 
under  his  coat-tails.  Such  tranquil  stupidity,  such  supernat 
ural  gravity,  such  self-righteousness,  and  such  ineffable  self- 
complacency  as  were  in  the  countenance  and  attitude  of  that 
gray-bodied,  dark-winged,  bald-headed,  and  preposterously  un 
comely  bird !  He  was  so  ungainly,  so  pimply  about  the  head, 
so  scaly  about  the  legs;  yet  so  serene,  so  unspeakably  satis 
fied  !  He  was  the  most  comical-looking  creature  that  can  be 
imagined.  It  was  good  to  hear  Dan  and  the  doctor  laugh — 
such  natural  and  such  enjoyable  laughter  had  not  been  heard 
among  our  excursionists  since  our  ship  sailed  away  from 
America.  This  bird  was  a  godsend  to  us,  and  I  should  be  an 
ingrate  if  I  forgot  to  make  honorable  mention  of  him  in  these 
pages.  Ours  was  a  pleasure  excursion;  therefore  we  stayed 
with  that  bird  an  hour,  and  made  the  most  of  him.  We  stirred 
him  up  occasionally,  but  he  only  unclosed  an  eye  and  slowly 
closed  it  again,  abating  no  jot  of  his  stately  piety  of  demeanor 
or  his  tremendous  seriousness.  He  only  seemed  to  say,  "De 
file  not  Heaven's  anointed  with  unsanctified  hands."  We  did 
not  know  his  name,  and  so  we  called  him  "The  Pilgrim."  Dan 
said: 

"All  he  wants  now  is  a  Plymouth  Collection." 
The  boon  companion  of  the  colossal  elephant  was  a  common 
cat !  This  cat  had  a  fashion  of  climbing  up  the  elephant's 
hind  legs,  and  roosting  on  his  back.  She  would  sit  up  there, 
with  her  paws  curved  under  her  breast,  and  sleep  in  the  sun 
half  the  afternoon.  It  used  to  annoy  the  elephant  at  first,  and 
he  would  reach  up  and  take  her  down,  but  she  would  go  aft 
and  climb  up  again.  She  persisted  until  she  finally  conquered 
the  elephant's  prejudices,  and  now  they  are  inseparable  friends. 
The  cat  plays  about  her  comrade's  fore  feet  or  his  trunk  often, 
until  dogs  approach,  and  then  she  goes  aloft  out  of  danger. 
The  elephant  has  annihilated  several  dogs  lately,  that  pressed 
his  companion  too  closely. 

We  hired  a  sailboat  and  a  guide  and  made  an  excursion  to 
one  of  the  small  islands  in  the  harbor  to  visit  the  Castle  d'If. 
This  ancient  fortress  has  a  melancholy  history.  It  has  been 
used  as  a  prison  for  political  offenders  for  two  or  three  hun 
dred  years,  and  its  dungeon  walls  are  scarred  with  the  rudely 
carved  names  of  many  and  many  a  captive  who  fretted  his  life 


64  MARK  TWAIN 

away  here,  and  left  no  record  of  himself  but  these  sad  epitaphs 
wrought  with  his  own  hands.  How  thick  the  names  were! 
And  their  long-departed  owners  seemed  to  throng  the  gloomy 
cells  and  corridors  with  their  phantom  shapes.  We  loitered 
through  dungeon  after  dungeon,  away  down  into  the  living 
rock  below  the  level  of  the  sea,  it  seemed.  Names  everywhere ! 
— some  plebeian,  some  noble,  some  even  princely.  Plebian, 
prince,  and  noble  had  one  solicitude  in  common — they  would 
not  be  forgotten!  They  could  suffer  solitude,  inactivity,  and 
the  horrors  of  a  silence  that  no  sound  ever  disturbed ;  but  they 
could  not  bear  the  thought  of  being  utterly  forgotten  by  the 
world.  Hence  the  carved  names.  In  one  cell,  where  a  little 
light  penetrated,  a  man  had  lived  twenty-seven  years  without 
seeing  the  face  of  a  human  being — lived  in  filth  and  wretched 
ness,  with  no  companionship  but  his  own  thoughts,  and  they 
were  sorrowful  enough,  and  hopeless  enough,  no  doubt. 
Whatever  his  jailers  considered  that  he  needed  was  conveyed 
to  his  cell  by  night,  through  a  wicket.  This  man  carved  the 
walls  of  his  prison-house  from  floor  to  roof  with  all  manner  of 
figures  of  men  and  animals,  grouped  in  intricate  designs.  He 
had  toiled  there  year  after  year,  at  his  self-appointed  task, 
while  infants  grew  to  boyhood — to  vigorous  youth — idled 
through  school  and  college — acquired  a  profession — claimed 
man's  mature  estate — married  and  looked  back  to  infancy  as 
a  thing  of  -some  vague,  ancient  time,  almost.  But  who  shall 
tell  how  many  ages  it  seemed  to  this  prisoner?  With  the  one, 
time  flew  sometimes;  with  the  other,  never — it  crawled  al 
ways.  To  the  one,  nights  spent  in  dancing  had  seemed  made 
of  minutes  instead  of  hours;  to  the  other,  those  selfsame 
nights  had  been  like  all  other  nights  of  dungeon  life,  and 
seemed  made  of  slow,  dragging  weeks,  instead  of  hours  andj 
minutes. 

One  prisoner  of  fifteen  years  had  scratched  verses  upon 
his  walls,  and  brief  prose  sentences — brief,  but  full  of  pathos. 
These  spoke  not  of  himself  and  his  hard  estate:  but  only  of 
the  shrine  where  his  spirit  fled  the  prison  to  worship — of  home 
and  the  idols  that  were  templed  there.  He  never  lived  to  see 
them. 

The  walls  of  these  dungeons  are  thick  as  some  bed-chambers 
at  home  are  wide — fifteen,  feet.  We  saw  the  damp,  dismal  cells 
in  which  two  of  Dumas's  heroes  passed  their  confinement — 
heroes  of  Mcnte  Crist o.  It  was  here  that  the  brave  Abbe  wrote 
a  book  with  his  own  blood ;  with  a  pen  made  of  a  piece  of  iron 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  65 

hoop,  and  by  the  light  of  a  lamp  made  out  of  shreds  of  cloth 
soaked  in  grease  obtained  from  his  food ;  and  then  dug  through 
the  thick  wall  with  some  trifling  instrument  which  he  wrought 
himself  out  of  a  stray  piece  of  iron  or  table  cutlery,  and  freed 
Dantes  from  his  chains.  It  was  a  pity  that  so  many  weeks  of 
dreary  labor  should  have  come  to  naught  at  last. 

They  showed  us  the  noisome  cell  where  the  celebrated  "Iron 
Mask" — that  ill-starred  brother  of  a  hard-hearted  king  of 
France — was  confined  for  a  season,  before  he  was  sent  to  hide 
the  strange  mystery  of  his  life  from  the  curious  in  the  dungeons 
of  St.  Marguerite.  The  place  had  a  far  greater  interest  for 
us  than  it  could  have  had  if  we  had  known  beyond  all  question 
who  the  Iron  Mask  was,  and  what  his  history  had  been,  and 
why  this  most  unusual  punishment  had  been  meted  out  to 
him.  Mystery  !  That  was  the  charm.  That  speechless  tongue, 
those  prisoned  features,  that  heart  so  freighted  with  unspoken 
troubles,  and  that  breast  so  oppressed  with  its  piteous  secret, 
had  been  here.  These  dank  walls  had  known  the  man  whose 
dolorous  story  is  a  sealed  book  forever!  There  was  fascina 
tion  in  the  spot. 


CHAPTER  XII 

•^^T  7E  have  come  five^Jiundred  miles  by  rail  through  the 
\\  heart  of  France.  (What  a  bewitching  land  it  is !  What. 
*  a  gardenT)  Surely  the  leagues  of  bright  green  lawns 
are  swept  and  brushed  and  watered  every  day  and  their  grasses 
trimmed  by  the  barber.  Surely  the  hedges  are  shaped  and 
measured  and  their  symmetry  preserved  by  the  most  archi 
tectural  of  gardeners.  Surely  the  long,  straight  rows  of 
stately  poplars  that  divide  the  beautiful  landscape  like  the 
squares  of  a  checker-board  are  set  with  line  and  plummet,  and 
their  uniform  height  determined  with  a  spirit  level.  Surely  the 
straight,  smooth,  pure  white  turnpikes  are  jack-planed  and 
sand-papered  every  day.  How  else  are  these  marvels  of  sym 
metry,  cleanliness,  and  order  attained?  It  is  wonderful. 
There  are  no  unsightly  stone  walls,  and  never  a  fence  of  any- 
kind.  There  is  no  dirt,  no  decay,  no  rubbish  anywhere — noth 
ing  that  even  hints  at  untidiness — nothing  that  ever  suggests 
neglect.  All  is  orderly  and  beautiful — everything  is  charming 
to  the  eye. 

We  had  such  glimpses  of  the  Rhone  gliding  along  between 
its  grassy  banks ;  of  cozy  cottages  buried  in  flowers  and  shrub 
bery;  of  quaint  old  red-tiled  villages  with  mossy  medieval 
cathedrals  looming  out  of  their  midst ;  of  wooded  hills  with 
ivy-grown  towers  and  turrets  of  feudal  castles  projecting 
above  the  foliage;  such  glimpses  of  Paradise,  it  seemed  to  us, 
such  visions  of  fabled  fairyland ! 

We  knew  then,  what  the  poet  meant,  when  he  sang  of — 

" — thy  corn-fields  green,  and  sunny  vines, 
O   pleasant   land   of    France  I" 

And  it  is  a  pleasant  land.  No  word  described  it  so  felici 
tously  as  that  one.  They  say  there  is  no  word  for  "home"  in 
the  French  language.  Well,  considering  that  they  have  the 
article  itself  in  such  an  attractive  aspect,  they  ought  to  manage 
to  get  along  without  the  word.  Let  us  not  waste  too  much 
pity  on  "homeless"  France.  I  have  observed  that  Frenchmen 

66 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  67 

aboard  seldom  wholly  give  up  the  idea  of  going  hack  to  France 
some  time  or  other.  1  am  not  surprised  at  it  now. 

We  are  not  infatuated  with  these  French  railway  cars, 
though.  We  took  first-class  passage,  not  because  we  wished 
to  attract  attention  by  doing  a  thing  which  is  uncommon  in 
Europe,  but  because  we  could  make  our  journey  quicker  by 
so  doing.  It  is  hard  to  make  railroading  pleasant,  in  any 
country.  It  is  too  tedious.  Stage-coaching  is  infinitely  more 
delightful.  Once  I  crossed  the  plains  and  deserts  and  moun 
tains  of  the  West,  in  a  stage-coach,  from  the  Missouri  line  to 
California,  and  since  then  all  my  pleasure  trips  must  be 
measured  to  that  rare  holiday  frolic.  Two  thousand  miles  of 
ceaseless  rush  and  rattle  and  clatter,  by  night  and  by  day,  and 
never  a  weary  moment,  never  a  lapse  of  interest!  The  first 
seven  hundred  miles  a  level  continent,  its  grassy  carpet  greener 
and  softer  and  smoother  than  any  sea,  and  figured  with  designs 
fitted  to  its  magnitude — the  shadows  of  the  clouds.  Here 
were  no  scenes  but  summer  scenes,  and  no  disposition  inspired 
by  them  but  to  lie  at  full  length  on  the  mailsacks,  in  the  grate 
ful  breeze,  and  dreamily  smoke  the  pipe  of  peace — what  other, 
where  all  was  repose  and  contentment?  In  cool  mornings, 
before  the  sun  was  fairly  up,  it  was  worth  a  lifetime-  -O^  city 
toiling  and  moiling,  to  perch  in  the  f  oretop  with  the  driver  and 
see  the  six  mustangs  scamper  under  the  sharp  snapping  of  a 
whip  that  never  touched  them;  to  scan  the  blue  distances  of 
a  world  that  knew  no  lords  but  us ;  to  cleave  the  wind  with 
uncovered  head  and  feel  the  sluggish  pulses  rousing  to  the 
spirit  of  a  steed  that  pretended  to  the  resistless  rush  of  a 
typhoon  !  Then  thirteen  hundred  miles  of  desert  solitudes ;  of 
limitless  panoramas  of  bewildering  perspective;  of  mimic  cities, 
of  pinnacled  cathedrals,  of  massive  fortresses,  counterfeited 
in  the  eternal  rocks  and  splendid  with  the  crimson  and  gold  of 
the  setting  sun ;  of  dizzy  altitudes  among  fog-wreathed  peaks 
and  nevermelting  snows,  where  thunders  and  lightnings  and 
tempests  warred  magnificently  at  our  feet  and  the  storm-clouds 
above  swung  their  shredded  banners  in  our  very  faces ! 

But  I  forgot.  I  am  in  elegant  France,  now,  and  not  scurry 
ing  through  the  great  South  Pass  and  the  Wind  River  Moun 
tains,  among  antelopes  and  buffaloes,  and  painted  Indians  on 
the  war-path.  It  is  not  meet  that  I  should  make  too  dis 
paraging  comparisons  between  humdrum  travel  on  a  rail 
way  and  that  royal  summer  flight  across  a  continent  in  a  stage 
coach.  I  meant,  in  the  beginning,  to  say  that  railway  journey- 


68  MARK  TWAIN 

ing  is  tedious  and  tiresome,  and  so  it  is — though,  at  the  time, 
I  was  thinking  particularly  of  a  dismal  fifty-hour  pilgrimage 
between  New  York  and  St.  Louis.  Of  course  our  trip  through 
France  was  not  really  tedious,  because  all  its  scenes  arid  ex 
periences  were  new  and  strange;  but  as  Dan  says,  it  had  its 
"discrepancies." 

The  cars  are  built  in  compartments  that  hold  eight  persons 
each.  Each  compartment  is  partially  subdivided,  and  so  there 
are  two  tolerably  distinct  parties  of  four  in  it.  Four  face  the 
other  four.  The  seats  and  backs  are  thickly  padded  and 
cushioned,  and  are  very  comfortable;  you  can  smoke,  if  you 
wish ;  there  are  no  bothersome  peddlers ;  you  are  saved  the 
infliction  of  a  multitude  of  disagreeable  fellow-passengers. 
So  far,  so  well.  But  then  the  conductor  locks  you  in  when 
the  train  starts ;  there  is  no  water  to  drink  in  the  car ;  there  is 
no  heating  apparatus  for  night  travel;  if  a  drunken  rowdy 
should  get  in,  you  could  not  remove  a  matter  of  twenty  seats 
from  him,  or  enter  another  car;  but,  above  all,  if  you  are 
worn  out  and  must  sleep,  you  must  sit  up  and  do  it  in  naps, 
with  cramped  legs  and  a  torturing  misery  that  leaves  you  with 
ered  and  lifeless  the  next  day — for  behold,  they  have  not  that 
culmination  of  all  charity  and  human  kindness,  a  sleeping-car, 
in  all  France.  I  prefer  the  American  system.  It  has  not  so 
many  grievous  "discrepancies." 

fin  France,  all  is  clockwork,  all  is  order.  They  make  no  mis 
takes.  Every  third  man  wears  a  uniform,  and  whether  he  be 
a  marshal  of  the  empire  or  a  brakeman,  he  is  ready  and  per 
fectly  willing"  to  answer  all  your  questions  with  tireless  po 
liteness,  ready  to  tell  you  which  car  to  take,  yea,  and  ready 
to  go  and  put  you  into  it  to  make  sure  that  you  shall  not  go 
astray?)  You  cannot  pass  into  the  waiting-room  of  the  depot 
till  you  have  secured  your  ticket,  and  you  cannot  pass  from  its 
only  exit  till  the  train  is  at  its  threshold  to  receive  you.  Once 
on  board,  the  train  will  not  start  till  your  ticket  has  been  ex 
amined — till  every  passenger's  ticket  has  been  inspected.  This 
is  chiefly  for  your  own  good.  If  by  any  possibility'  you  have 
managed  to  take  the  wrong  train,  you  will  be  handed  over  to 
a  polite  official  who  will  take  you  whither  you  belong,  and 
bestow  you  with  many  an  affable  bow.  Your  ticket  will  be 
inspected  every  now  and  then  along  the- route,  and  when  it 
is  time  to  change  cars  you 'will  know  it.  (You  are  in  the  hands 
: :  of  officials  who  zealously  study  your  welfare  and  your  interest, 
instead  of  turning  their  talents  to  the  invention  of  new  methods 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  69 

of  discommoding  and  snubbing  you,  as  is  very  often  the  main 
employment  of  that  exceedingly  self-satisfied  monarch,  the 
railroad  conductor  of  America^) 

But  the  happiest  regulation  in  French  railway  government, 
is — thirty  minutes  to  dinner !  No  five-minute  boltings  of  flabby 
rolls,  muddy  coffee,  questionable  eggs,  gutta-percha  beef,  and 
pies  whose  conception  and  execution  are  a  dark  and  bloody 
mystery  to  all  save  the  cook  who  created  them !  No ;  we  sat 
calmly  down — it  was  in  old  Dipon,  which  is  so  easy  to  spell 
and  so  impossible  to  pronounce,  except  when  you  civilize  it 
and  call  it  Demijohn — and  poured  out  rich  Burgundian  wines 
and  munched  calmly  through  a  table  d'hote  bill  of  fare,  snail 
patties,  delicious  fruits  and  all,  then  paid  the  trifle  it  cost  and 
stepped  happily  aboard  the  train  again,  without  once  cursing 
the  railroad  company.  A  rare  experience,  and  one  to  be 
treasured  forever. 

They  say  they  do  not  have  accidents  on  these  French  roads, 
and  I  think  it  must  be  true.  If  I  remember  rightly,  we  passed 
high  above  wagon  roads,  or  through  tunnels  under  them,  but 
never  crossed  them  on  their  own  level.  About  every  quarter 
of  a  mile,  it  seemed  to  me,  a  man  came  out  and  held  up  a 
club  till  the  train  went  by,  to  signify  that  everything  was 
safe  ahead.  Switches  were  changed  a  mile  in  advance,  by 
pulling  a  wire  rope  that  passed  along  the  ground  by  the  rail, 
from  station  to  station.  Signals  for  the  day  and  signals  for 
the  night  gave  constant  and  timely  notice  of  the  position  of 
of  switches. 

No,  they  have  no  railroad  accidents  to  speak  of  in  France. 
But  why?  Because  when  one  occurs  somebody  has  to  hang 
for  it  I1  Not  hang,  maybe,  but  be  punished  at  least  with  such 
vigor  of  emphasis  as  to  make  negligence  a  thing  to  be  shud 
dered  at  by  railroad  officials  for  many  a  day  thereafter.  "No 
blame  attached  to  the  officers" — that  lying  and  disaster-breed 
ing  verdict  so  common  to  our  soft-hearted  juries,  is  seldom 
rendered  in  France.  If  the  trouble  occurred  in  the  conductor's 
department,  that  officer  must  suffer  if  his  subordinate  cannot 
be  proven  guilty ;  if  in  the  engineer's  department,  and  the  case 
be  similar,  the  engineer  must  answer. 

The  Old  Travelers — those  delightful  parrots  who  have  "been 
here  before,"  and  know  more  about  the  country  than  Louis 
Napoleon  knows  now  or  ever  will  know, — tell  us  these  things, 

1They  go  on  the  principle  that  it  is  better  that  one  innocent  man  should 
suffer  than  five  hundred. 


70  MARK  TWAIN 

and  we  believe  them  because  they  are  pleasant  things  to  be 
lieve,  and  because  they  are  plausible  and  savor  of  the  rigid 
subjection  to  law  and  order  which  we  behold  about  us  every 
where. 

But  we  love  the  Old  Travelers.  We  love  to  hear  them  prate 
and  drivel  and  lie.  We  can  tell  them  the  moment  we  see  them. 
They  always  throw  out  a  few  feelers:  they  never  cast  them 
selves  adrift  till  they  have  sounded  every  individual  and 
know  that  he  has  not  traveled.  Then  they  open  their  throttle- 
valves,  and  how  they  do  brag,  and  sneer,  and  swell,  and  soar, 
and  blaspheme  the  sacred  name  of  Truth !  Their  central  idea, 
their  grand  aim,  is  to  subjugate  you,  keep  you  down,  make 
you  feel  insignificant  and  humble  in  the  blaze  of  their  cosmo 
politan  glory!  They  will  not  let  you  know  anything.  They 
sneer  at  your  most  inoffensive  suggestions;  they  laugh  unfeel 
ingly  at  your  treasured  dreams  of  foreign  lands;  they  brand 
the  statements  of  your  traveled  aunts  and  uncles  as  the 
stupidest  absurdities;  they  deride  your  most  trusted  authors 
and  demolish  the  fair  images  they  have  set  up  for  your  willing 
worship  with  the  pitiless  ferocity  of  the  fanatic  iconoclast! 
But  still  I  love  the  Old  Travelers.  I  love  them  for  their  witless 
platitudes;  for  their  supernatural  ability  to  bore;  for  their 
delightful  asinine  vanity ;  for  their  luxuriant  fertility  of  imag 
ination;  for  their  startling,  their  brilliant,  their  overwhelming 
mendacity ! 

By  Lyons  and  the  Saone  (where  we  saw  the  Lady  of  Lyons 
and  thought  little  of  her  comeliness)  ;  by  Villa  Franca,  Ton- 
nerre,  venerable  Sens,  Melun,  Fontainebleau,  and  scores  of 
other  beautiful  cities,  we  swept,  always  noting  the  absence 
of  hog-wallows,  broken  fences,  cow-lots,  unpainted  houses,  and 
mud,  and  always  noting,  as  well,  the  presence  of  cleanliness, , 
grace,  taste  in  adorning  and  beautifying,  even  to  the  disposition  ; 
of  a  tree  or  the  turning  of  a  hedge,  the  marvel  of  roads  in  per 
fect  repair,  void  of  ruts  and  guiltless  of  even  an  inequality  of 
surface — we  bowled  along,  hour  after  hour,  that  brilliant 
summer  day,  and  as  nightfall  approached  we  entered  a  wilder 
ness  of  odorous  flowers  and  shrubbery,  sped  through  it,  and 
then,  excited,  delighted,  and  half  persuaded  that  we  were  only 
the  sport  of  a  beautiful  dream,  lo,  we  stood  in  magnificent 
Paris ! 

What  excellent  order  'they  kept  about  that  vast  depot! 
There  was  no  frantic  crowding  and  jostling,  no  shouting  and 
swearing,  and  no  swaggering  intrusion  of  services  by  rowdy 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  71 

hackmen.  These  latter  gentry  stood  outside — stood  quietly 
by  their  long  line  of  vehicles  and  said  never  a  word.  A  kind 
of  hackman-general  seemed  to  have  the  whole  matter  of  trans 
portation  in  his  hands.  He  politely  received  the  passengers  and 
ushered  them  to  the  kind  of  conveyance  they  wanted,  and  told 
the  driver  where  to  deliver  them.  There  was  no  "talking 
back,"  no  dissatisfaction  about  overcharging,  no  grumbling 
about  anything.  In  a  little  while  we  were  speeding  through 
the  streets  of  Paris,  and  delightfully  recognizing  certain  names 
and  places  with  which  books  had  long  ago  made  us  familiar. 
It  was  like  meeting  an  old  friend  when  we  read  "Rue  dc 
Rivoli"  on  the  street  corner ;  we  knew  the  genuine  vast  palace 
of  the  Louvre  as  well  as  we  knew  its  picture ;  when  we  passed 
by  the  Column  of  July  we  needed  no  one  to  tell  us  what  it  was, 
or  to  remind  us  that  on  its  site  once  stood  the  grim  Bastile, 
that  grave  of  human  hopes  and  happiness,  that  dismal  prison- 
house  within  whose  dungeons  so  many  young  faces  put  on  the 
wrinkles  of  age,  so  many  proud  spirits  grew  humble,  so  many 
brave  hearts  broke. 

We  secured  rooms  at  the  hotel,  or  rather,  we  had  three 
beds  put  into  one  room,  so  that  we  might  be  together,  and  then 
we  went  out  to  a  restaurant,  just  after  lamp-lighting,  and 
ate  a  comfortable,  satisfactory,  lingering  dinner.  It  was  a 
pleasure  to  eat  where  everything  was  so  tidy,  the  food  so  well 
cooked,  the  waiters  so  polite,  and  the  coming  and  departing 
company  so  mustached,  so  frisky,  so  affable,  so  fearfully  and 
wonderfully  Frenchy!  All  the  surroundings  were  gay  and 
enlivening.  Two  hundred  people  sat  at  little  tables  on  the 
sidewalk,  sipping  wine  and  coffee;  the  streets  were  thronged 
with  light  vehicles  and  with  joyous  pleasure-seekers ;  there  was 
music  in  the  air,  life  and  action  all  about  us,  and  a  conflagration 
of  gaslight  everywhere! 

After  dinner  we  felt  like  seeing  such  Parisian  specialties 
as  we  might  see  without  distressing  exertion,  and  so  we 
sauntered  through  the  brilliant  streets  and  looked  at  the  dainty 
trifles  in  variety  stores  and  jewelry  shops.  Occasionally,  merely 
for  the  pleasure  of  being  cruel,  we  put  unoffending  French 
men  on  the  rack  with  questions  framed  in  the  incomprehensible 
jargon  of  their  native  language,  and  while  they  writhed,  we 
impaled  them,  we  peppered  them  we  scarified  them  with  their 
own  vile  verbs  and  participles. 

We  noticed  that  in  the  jewelry  stores  they  had  some  of 
the  articles  marked  "gold,"  and  some  labeled  "imitation."  We 


72  MARK  TWAIN 

wondered  at  this  extravagance  of  honesty,  and  inquired  into 
the  matter.  We  were  informed  that  inasmuch  as  most  people 
are  not  able  to  tell  false  gold  from  the  genuine  article,  the 
government  compels  jewelers  to  have  their  gold  work  assayed 
and  stamped  officially  according  to  its  fineness,  and  their  imi 
tation  work  duly  labeled  with  the  sign  of  its  falsity.  They 
told  us  the  jewelers  would  not  dare  to  violate  this  law,  and  that 
whatever  a  stranger  bought  in  one  of  their  stores  might  be 
depended  upon  as  being  strictly  what  it  was  represented  to  be. 
Verily,  a  wonderful  land  is  France! 

Then  we  hunted  for  a  barber  shop.  From  earliest  infancy 
it  had  been  a  cherished  ambition  of  mine  to  be  shaved  some  day 
in  a  palatial  barber  shop  of  Paris.  I  wished  to  recline  at  full 
length  in  a  cushioned  invalid-chair,  with  pictures  about  me,  and 
sumptuous  furniture ;  with  frescoed  walls  and  gilded  arches 
above  me,  and  vistas  of  Corinthian  columns  stretching  far 
before  me,  with  perfumes  of  Araby  to  intoxicate  my  senses, 
and  the  slumbrous  drone  of  distant  noises  to  soothe  me  to 
sleep.  At  the  end  of  an  hour  I  would  wake  up  regretfully 
and  find  my  face  as  smooth  and  as  soft  as  an  infant's.  De 
parting,  I  would  lift  my  hands  above  that  barber's  head  and 
say,  "Heaven  bless  you,  my  son!" 

So  we  searched  high  and  low,  for  a  matter  of  two  hours, 
but  never  a  barber  shop  could  we  see.  We  saw  only  wig- 
making  establishments,  with  shocks  of  dead  and  repulsive  hair 
bound  upon  the  heads  of  painted  waxen  brigands  who  stared 
out  from  glass  boxes  upon  the  passer-by,  with  their  stony  eyes, 
arid  scared  him  with  the  ghostly  white  of  their  countenances. 
We  shunned  these  signs  for  a  time,  but  finally  we  concluded 
that  the  wig-makers  must  of  necessity  be  the  barbers  as  well, 
since  we  could  find  no  single  legitimate  representative  of  the  > 
fraternity.  We  entered  and  asked,  and  found  that  it  was  even  so. 

I  said  I  wanted  to  be  shaved.  The  barber  inquired  where 
my  room  was.  I  said,  never  mind  where  my  room  was,  I 
wanted  to  be  shaved — there,  on  the  spot.  The  doctor  said  he 
would  be  shaved  also.  Then  there  was  an  excitement  among 
those  two  barbers !  There  was  a  wild  consultation,  and  after 
ward  a  hurrying  to  and  fro  and  a  feverish  gathering  up  of 
razors  from  obscure  places  and  a  ransacking  for  soap.  Next 
they  took  us  into  a  little  mean,  shabby  back  room;  they  got 
two  ordinary  sitting-room  chairs  and  placed  us  in  them,  with 
out  coats  on.  My  old,  old  dream  of  bliss  vanished  into  thin  air  ! 

I   sat  bolt  upright,   silent,   sad,   and   solemn.     One  of   the 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  73 

wig-making  villains  lathered  my  face  for  ten  terrible  min 
utes  and  finished  by  plastering  a  mass  of  suds  into  my  mouth. 
I  expelled  the  nasty  stuff  with  a  strong  English  expletive  and 
said,  "Foreigner,  beware!"  Then  this  outlaw  strapped  his 
razor  on  his  boot,  hovered  over  me  ominously  for  six  fearful 
seconds,  and  then  swooped  down  upon  me  like  the  genius  of 
destruction.  The  first  rake  of  his  razor  loosened  the  very  hide 
from  my  face  and  lifted  me  out  of  the  chair.  I  stormed  and 
raved,  and  the  other  boys  enjoyed  it.  Their  beards  are  not 
strong  and  thick.  Let  us  draw  the  curtain  over  this  harrow 
ing  scene.  Suffice  it  that  I  submitted,  and  went  through  with 
the  cruel  infliction  of  a  shave  by  a  French  barber;  tears  of 
exquisite  agony  coursed  down  my  cheeks,  now  and  then,  but 
I  survived.  Then  the  incipient  assassin  held  a  basin  of  water 
under  my  chin  and  slopped  its  contents  over  my  face,  and  into 
my  bosom,  and  down  the  back  of  my  neck,  with  a  mean  pre 
tense  of  washing  away  the  soap  and  blood.  He  dried  my 
features  with  a  towel  and  was  going  to  comb  my  hair;  but  I 
asked  to  be  excused.  I  said,  with  withering  irony,  that  it 
was  sufficient  to  be  skinned — I  declined  to  be  scalped. 

I  went  away  from  there  with  my  handkerchief  about  my 
face,  and  never,  never,  never  desired  to  dream  of  palatial 
Parisian  barber  shops  any  more.  The  truth  is,  as  I  believe 
I  have  since  found  out,  that  they  have  no  barber  shops  worthy 
of  the  name  in  Paris — and  no  barbers,  either,  for  that  matter. 
The  imposter  who  does  duty  as  a  barber  brings  his  pans 
and  napkins  and  implements  of  torture  to  your  residence  and 
deliberately  skins  you  in  your  private  apartments.  Ah,  I 
have  suffered,  suffered,  suffered,  here  in  Paris,  but  never 
mind — the  time  is  coming  when  I  shall  have  a  dark  and  bloody 
revenge.  Some  day  a  Parisian  barber  will  come  to  my  room 
to  skin  me,  and  from  that  day  forth  that  barber  will  never 
be  heard  of  more. 

At  eleven  o'clock  we  alighted  upon  a  sign  which  manifestly 
referred  to  billiards.  Joy!  We  had  played  billiards  in  the 
Azores  with  balls  that  were  not  round,  and  on  an  ancient  table 
that  was  very  little  smoother  than  a  brick  pavement — one  of 
those  wretched  old  things  with  dead  cushions,  and  with  patches 
in  the  faded  cloth  and  invisible  obstructions  that  made  the 
balls  describe  the  most  astonishing  and  unsuspected  angles 
and  perform  feats  in  the  way  of  unlooked-for  and  almost  im 
possible  "scratches,"  that  were  perfectly  bewildering.  We  had 
played  at  Gibraltar  with  balls  the  size  of  a  walnut,  on  a  table 


74  MARK  TWAIN 

like  a  public  square — and  in  both  instances  we  achieved  far 
more  aggravation  than  amusement.  We  expected  to  fare  better 
here,  but  we  were  mistaken.  The  cushions  were  a  good  deal 
higher  than  the  balls,  and  as  the  balls  had  a  fashion  of  always 
stopping  under  the  cushions,  we  accomplished  very  little  in 
the  way  of  caroms.  The  cushions  were  hard  and  unelastic, 
and  the  cues  were  so  crooked  that  in  making  a  shot  you  had  to 
allow  for  the  curve  or  you  would  infallibly  put  the  "English" 
on  the  wrong  side  of  the  ball.  Dan  was  to  mark  while  the 
doctor  and  I  played.  At  the  end  of  an  hour  neither  of  us  had 
made  a  count,  and  so  Dan  was  tired  of  keeping  tally  with 
nothing  to  tally,  and  we  were  heated  and  angry  and  disgusted. 
We  paid  the  heavy  bill — about  six  cents — and  said  we  would 
call  around  some  time  when  we  had  a  week  to  spend,  and  finish 
the  game. 

We  adjourned  to  one  of  those  pretty  cafes  and  took 
supper  and  tested  the  wines  of  the  country,  as  we  had  been 
instructed  to  do,  and  found  them  harmless  and  unexciting. 
They  might  have  been  exciting,  however,  if  we  had  chosen  to 
drink  a  sufficiency  of  them. 

To  close  our  first  day  in  Paris  cheerfully  and  pleasantly, 
we  now  sought  our  grand  room  in  the  Grand  Hotel  du  Louvre 
and  climbed  into  our  sumptuous  bed,  to  read  and  smoke — but 
alas ! 

It  was  pitiful, 
In   a   whole   city-full, 
Gas   we   had   none. 

No  gas  to  read  by — nothing  but  dismal  candles.  It  was  a 
shame.  We  tried  to  map  out  excursions  for  the  morrow ;  we 
puzzled  over  French  "Guides  to  Paris" ;  we  talked  disjointedly, 
in  a  vain  endeavor  to  make  head  or  tail  of  the  wild  chaos  of 
the  day's  sights  and  experiences ;  we  subsided  to  indolent  smok 
ing;  we  gaped  and  yawned,  and  stretched — then  feebly  won 
dered  if  we  were  really  and  truly  in  renowned  Paris,  and 
drifted  drowsily  away  into  that  vast  mysterious  void  which 
men  call  sleep. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  next  morning  we  were  up  and  dressed  at  ten  o'clock. 
We  went  to  the  commissionaire  of  the  hotel — I  don't 
know  what  a  commissionaire  is,  but  that  is  the  man  we 
went  to — and  told  him  we  wanted  a  guide.  He  said  the  great 
International  Exposition  had  drawn  such  multitudes  of  Eng 
lishmen  and  Americans  to  Paris  that  it  would  be  next  to  im 
possible  to  find  a  good  guide  unemployed.  He  said  he  usually 
kept  a  dozen  or  two  on  hand,  but  he  only  had  three  now.  He 
called  them.  One  looked  so  like  a  very  pirate  that  we  let  him 
go  at  once.  The  next  one  spoke  with  a  simpering  precision  of 
pronunciation  that  was  irritating,  and  said : 

"If  ze  zhentlemans  will  to  me  make  ze  grande  honneur  to 
me  rattain  in  hees  service,  I  shall  show  to  him  everysing  zat 
is  magnifique  to  look  upon  in  ze  beautiful  Paree.  I  speaky 
ze  Angleesh  pairfaitemaw." 

He  would  have  done  well  to  have  stopped  there,  because 
he  had  that  much  by  heart  and  said  it  right  off  without  making 
a  mistake.  But  his  self-complacency  seduced  him,  into  at 
tempting  a  flight  into  regions  of  unexplored  English,  and  the 
reckless  experiment  was  his  ruin.  Within  ten  seconds  he 
was  so  tangled  up  in  a  maze  of  mutilated  verbs  and  torn  and 
bleeding  forms  of  speech  that  no  human  ingenuity  could  ever 
have  gotten  him  out  of  it  with  credit.  It  was  plain  enough  that 
he  could  not  "speaky"  the  English  quite  as  "pairfaitemaw"  as 
he  had  pretended  he  could. 

The  third  man  captured  us.  He  was  plainly  dressed,  but 
he  had  a  noticeable  air  of  neatness  about  him.  He  wore  a 
high  silk  hat  which  was  a  little  odd,  but  had  been  carefully 
brushed.  He  wore  second-hand  kid  gloves,  in  good  repair,  and 
carried  a  small  rattan  cane  with  a  curved  handle — a  female  leg, 
of  ivory.  He  stepped  as  gently  and  as  daintily  as  a  cat  crossing 
a  muddy  street;  and  oh,  he  was  urbanity;  he  was  quiet,  un 
obtrusive  self-possession ;  he  was  deference  itself  !  He  spoke 
softly  and  guardedly;  and  when  he  was  about  to  make  a  state 
ment  on  his  sole  responsibility,  or  offer  a  suggestion,  he 
weighed  it  by  drachms  and  scruples  first,  with  the  crook  of  his 


76  MARK  TWAIN 

little  stick  placed  meditatively  to  his  teeth.  His  opening  speech 
was  perfect.  It  was  perfect  in  construction,  in  phraseology,  in 
grammar,  in  emphasis,  in  pronunciation— everything.  He 
spoke  little  and  guardedly,  after  that.  We  were  charmed. 
We  were  more  than  charmed — we  were  overjoyed.  We  hired 
him  at  once.  We  never  even  asked  him  his  price.  This  man — 
our  lackey,  our  servant,  our  unquestioning  slave  though  he 
was,  was  still  a  gentleman — we  could  see  that — while  of  the 
other  two  one  was  coarse  and  awkward,  and  the  other  was  a 
born  pirate.  We  asked  our  man  Friday's  name.  He  drew 
from  his  pocketbook  a  snowy  little  card,  and  passed  it  to  us 
with  a  profound  bow : 

A.        BlLLFINGER, 

Guide   to    Paris,    France,    Germany, 

Spain,    &c.,    &c., 
Grande    Hotel    du    Louvre. 

"Billfinger  !     Oh,  carry  me  home  to  die !" 

That  was  an  "aside"  from  Dan.  The  atrocious  name  grated 
harshly  on  my  ear,  too.  The  most  of  us  can  learn  to  forgive 
and  even  to  like,  a  countenance  that  strikes  us  unpleasantly  at 
first,  but  few  of  us,  I  fancy,  become  reconciled  to  a  jarring 
name  so  easily.  I  was  almost  sorry  we  had  hired  this  man,  his 
name  was  so  unbearable.  However,  no  matter.  We  were 
impatient  to  start.  Billfinger  stepped  to  the  door  to  call  a 
carriage,  and  then  the  doctor  said: 

"Well,  the  guide  goes  with  the  barber  shop,  with'  the 
billiard  table,  with  the  gasless  room,  and  maybe  with  many 
another  pretty  romance  of  Paris.  I  expected  to  have  a  guide 
named  Henri  de  Montmorency,  or  Armand  de  la  Chartreuse, 
or  something  that  would  sound  grand  in  letters  to  the  villagers 
at  home;  but  to  think  of  a  Frenchman  by  the  name  of  Bill- 
finger  !  Oh !  this  is  absurd,  you  know.  This  will  never  do. 
We  can't  say  Billfinger;  it  is  nauseating.  Name  him  over 
again;  what  had  we  better  call  him?  Alexis  du  Caulain- 
court?" 

"Alphonse  Henri  Gustave  de  Hauteville,"  I  suggested. 

"Call  him  Ferguson,"  said  Dan. 

That  was  practical,  unromantic  good  sense.  Without  debate, 
we  expunged  Billfinger  as  Billfinger,  and  called  him  Ferguson. 

The  carriage — an  open  barouche — was  ready.  Ferguson 
mounted  beside  the  driver,  and  we  whirled  away' to  breakfast. 
As  was  proper,  Mr.  Ferguson  stood  by  to  transmit  our  orders 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  77 

and  answer  questions.  By  and  by,  he  mentioned  casually — the 
artful  adventurer — that  he  would  go  and  get  his  breakfast  as 
soon  as  we  had  finished  ours.  He  knew  we  could  not  get  along 
without  him,  and  that  we  would  not  want  to  loiter  about  and 
wait  for  him.  We  asked  him  to  sit  down  and  eat  with  us.  He 
begged,  with  many  a  bow,  to  be  excused.  It  was  not  proper, 
he  said;  he  would  sit  at  another  table.  We  ordered  him 
peremptorily  to  sit  down  with  us. 

Here  endeth  the  first  lesson.     It  was  a  mistake. 

As  long  as  we  had  the  fellow  after  that,  he  was  always 
hungry;  he  was  always  thirsty.  He  came  early;  he  stayed 
late;  he  could  not  pass  a  restaurant;  he  looked  with  lecherous 
eye  upon  every  wine  shop.  Suggestions  to  stop,  excuses  to 
eat  and  to  drink  were  forever  on  his  lips.  We  tried  all  we 
could  to  fill  him  so  full  that  he  would  have  no  room  to  spare 
for  a  fortnight;  but  it  was  a  failure.  He  did  not  hold 
enough  to  smother  the  cravings  of  his  super-human  appetite. 

He  had  another  "discrepancy"  about  him.  He  was  always 
wanting  us  to  buy  things.  On  the  shallowest  pretenses,  he 
would  inveigle  us  into  shirt  stores,  boot  stores,  tailor  shops, 
glove  shops — anywhere  under  the  broad  sweep  of  the  heavens 
that  there  seemed  a  chance  of  our  buying  anything.  Any  one 
could  have  guessed  that  the  shopkeepers  paid  him  a  per 
centage  on  the  sales;  but  in  our  blessed  innocence  we  didn't, 
until  this  feature  of  his  conduct  grew  unbearably  prominent. 
One  day,  Dan  happened  to  mention  that  he  thought  of  buying 
three  or  four  silk  dress-patterns  for  presents.  Ferguson's 
hungry  eye  was  upon  him  in  an  instant.  In  the  course  of 
twenty  minutes,  the  carriage  stopped. 

"What's  this?" 

"Zis  is  ze  finest  silk  magazin  in  Paris — ze  most  celebrate." 

"What  did  you  come  here  for?  We  told  you  to  take  us  to 
the  palace  of  the  Louvre." 

"I  suppose  ze  gentleman  say  he  wish  to  buy  some  silk." 

"You  are  not  required  to  'suppose'  things  for  the  party, 
Ferguson.  WTe  do  not  wish  to  tax  your  energies  too  much. 
We  will  bear  some  of  the  burden  and  heat  of  the  day  ourselves. 
We  will  endeavor  to  do  such  'supposing'  as  is  really  necessary 
to  be  done.  Drive  on."  So  spake  the  doctor. 

Within  fifteen  minutes  the  carriage  halted  again,  and  before 
another  silk  store.  The  doctor  said : 

"Ah,  the  palace  of  the  Louvre;  beautiful,  beautiful  edifice! 
Does  the  Emperor  Napoleon  live  here  now,  Ferguson?" 


78  MARK  TWAIN 

"Ah,  doctor!  you  do  jest;  zis  is  not  ze  palace;  we  come 
there  directly.  But  since  we  pass  right  by  zis  store,  where 
is  such  beautiful  silk — " 

"Ah!  I  see,  I  see.  I  meant  to  have  told  you  that  we  did 
not  wish  to  purchase  any  silks  to-day ;  but  in  my  absent  minded- 
ness  I  forgot  it.  I  also  meant  to  tell  you  we  wished  to  go 
directly  to  the  Louvre;  but  I  forgot  that  also.  However,  we 
will  go  there  now.  Pardon  my  seeming  carelessness,  Ferguson. 
Drive  on." 

Within  the  half -hour,  we  stopped  again — in  front  of  another 
silk  store.  We  were  angry ;  but  the  doctor  was  always  serene, 
always  smooth-voiced.  He  said: 

"At  last !  How  imposing  the  Louvre  is,  and  yet  how  small ! 
how  exquisitely  fashioned !  how  charmingly  situated.  Ven 
erable,  venerable  pile — " 

"Pairdon,  doctor,  zis  is  not  ze  Louvre—it  is — " 

'What  is  it?" 

"I  have  ze  idea — it  come  to  me  in  a  moment — zat  ze  silk 
in  zis  magazin — " 

"Ferguson,  how  heedless  I  am !  I  fully  intended  to  tell 
you  that  we  did  not  wish  to  buy  any  silks  to-day,  and  I  also 
intended  to  tell  you  that  we  yearned  to  go  immediately  to 
the  palace  of  the  Louvre,  but  enjoying  the  happiness  of  see 
ing  you  devour  four  breakfasts  this  morning  has  so  filled  me 
with  pleasurable  emotions  that  I  neglect  the  commonest  in 
terests  of  the  time.  However,  we  will  proceed  now  to  the 
Louvre,  Ferguson." 

"But,  doctor"  (excitedly),  "It  will  take  not  a  minute — not 
but  one  small  minute !  Ze  gentleman  need  not  to  buy  if  he 
not  wish  to — but  only  look  at  ze  silk — look  at  ze  beautiful 
fabric."  [Then  pleadingly.]  "Sair — just  only  one  leetle 
moment !" 

Dan  said,  "Confound  the  idiot !  I  don't  want  to  see  any  silks 
to-day,  and  I  won't  look  at  them.  Drive  on." 

And  the  doctor :  "We  need  no  silks  now,  Ferguson.  Our 
hearts  yearn  for  the  Louvre.  Let  us  journey  on — let  us 
journey  on." 

"But,  doctor!  it  is  only  one  moment — one  leetle  moment. 
An  ze  time  will  be  save — entirely  save!  Because  zere  is 
nothing  to  see,  now — it  is  too  late.  It  want  ten  minute  to 
four  and  ze  Louvre  close  at  four — only  one  leetle  moment, 
doctor !" 

The  treacherous  miscreant!     After  four  breakfasts  and  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  79 

gallon  of  champagne,  to  serve  us  such  a  scurvy  trick.  We  got 
no  sight  of  the  countless  treasures  of  art  in  the  Louvre  gal 
leries  that  day,  and  our  only  poor  satisfaction  was  in  the 
reflection  that  Ferguson  sold  not  a  solitary  silk  dress-pattern. 

I  am  writing  this  chapter  partly  for  the  satisfaction  of 
abusing  that  accomplished  knave,  Billfinger,  and  partly  to 
show  whosoever  shall  read  this  how  Americans  fare  at  the 
hands  of  the  Paris  guides,  and  what  sort  of  people  Paris 
guides  are.  It  need  not  be  supposed  that  we  were  a  stupider 
or  an  easier  prey  than  our  countrymen  generally  are,  for 
we  were  not.  The  guides  deceive  and  defraud  every  American 
who  goes  to  Paris  for  the  first  time  and  sees  its  sights  alone 
or  in  company  with  others  as  little  experienced  as  himself. 
I  shall  visit  Paris  again  some  day,  and  then  let  the  guides  be 
ware!  I  shall  go  in  my  war-paint — I  shall  carry  my  toma 
hawk  along. 

I  think  we  have  lost  but  little  time  in  Paris.  We  have 
gone  to  bed  every  night  tired  out.  Of  course,  we  visited  the 
renowned  International  Exposition.  All  the  world  did  that. 
We  went  there  on  our  third  day  in  Paris — and  we  stayed  there 
nearly  two  hours.  That  was  our  first  and  last  visit.  To  tell 
the  truth,  we  saw  at  a  glance  that  one  would  have  to  spend 
weeks — yea,  even  months — in  that  monstrous  establishment, 
to  get  an  intelligible  idea  of  it.  It  was  a  wonderful  show,  but 
the  moving  masses  of  people  of  all  nations  we  saw  there  were 
a  still  more  wonderful  show.  I  discovered  that  if  I  were  to 
stay  there  a  month,  I  should  still  find  myself  looking  at  the 
people  instead  of  the  inanimate  objects  on  exhibition.  I  got 
a  little  interested  in  some  curious  old  tapestries  of  the  thir 
teenth  century,  but  a  party  of  Arabs  came  by,  and  their  dusky 
faces  and  quaint  costumes  called  my  attention  away  at  once. 
I  watched  a  silver  swan,  which  had  a  living  grace  about  his 
movements,  and  a  living  intelligence  in  his  eyes — watched  him 
swimming  about  as  comfortably  and  as  unconcernedly  as  if  he 
had  been  born  in  a  morass  instead  of  a  jeweler's  shop — 
watched  him  seize  a  silver  fish  from  under  the  water  and  hold 
up  his  head  and  go  through  all  the  customary  and  elaborate 
motions  of  swallowing  it — but  the  moment  it  disappeared 
down  his  throat  some  tattooed  South  Sea  Islanders  approached 
and  I  yielded  to  their  attractions.  Presently  I  found  a  re 
volving  pistol  several  hundred  years  old  which  looked  strangely 
like  a  modern  Colt,  but  just  then  I  heard  that  the  Empress 
of  the  French  was  in  another  part  of  the  building,  and  hastened 


II 


80  MARK  TWAIN 

away  to  see  what  she  might  look  like.  We  heard  martial 
music — we  saw  an  unusual  number  of  soldiers  walking  hur 
riedly  about — there  was  a  general  movement  among  the  people. 
We  inquired  what  it  was  all  about,  and  learned  that  the 
Emperor  of  the  French  and  the  Sultan  of  Turkey  were  about 
to  review  twenty-five  thousand  troops  at  the  Arc  de  1'^toile. 
We  immediately  departed.  I  had  a  greater  anxiety  to  see 
these  men  than  I  could  have  had  to  see  twenty  expositions. 

We  drove  away  and  took  up  a  position  in  an  open  space 
opposite  the  American  Minister's  house.  A  speculator  bridged 
a  couple  of  barrels  with  a  board  and  we  hired  standing-places 
on  it.  Presently  there  was  a  sound  of  distant  music ;  in  another 
minute  a  pillar  of  dust  came  moving  slowly  toward  us;  a 
moment  more,  and  then,  with  colors  flying  and  a  grand  crash 
of  military  music,  a  gallant  array  of  cavalrymen  emerged  from 
the  dust  and  came  down  the  street  on  a  gentle  trot.  After 
them  came  a  long  line  of  artillery;  then  more  cavalry,  in 
splendid  uniforms;  and  then  their  Imperial  Majesties,  Na 
poleon  III.  and  Abdul  Aziz.  The  vast  concourse  of  people 
swung  their  hats  and  shouted — the  windows  and  housetops  in 
the  wide  vicinity  burst  into  a  snow-storm  of  waving  handker 
chiefs,  and  the  wavers  of  the  same  mingled  their  cheers  with 
those  of  the  masses  below.  It  was  a  stirring  spectacle. 

But  the  two  central  figures  claimed  all  my  attention.  Was 
ever  such  a  contrast  set  up  before  a  multitude  till  then? 
Napoleon,  in  military  uniform — a  long-bodied,  short-legged 
man,  fiercely  mustached,  old,  wrinkled,  with  eyes  half  closed, 
and  such  a  deep,  crafty,  scheming  expression  about  them  I 
Napoleon,  bowing  ever  so  gently  to  the  loud  plaudits,  and 
watching  everything  and  everybody  with  his  cat-eyes  from 
under  his  depressed  hat-brim,  as  if  to  discover  any  sign  that 
those  cheers  were  not  heartfelt  and  cordial. 

Abdul  Aziz,  absolute  lord  of  the  Ottoman  Empire, — clad  in 
dark  green  European  clothes,  almost  without  ornament  or 
insignia  of  rank ;  a  red  Turkish  fez  on  his  head — a  short,  stout, 
dark  man,  black-bearded,  black-eyed,  stupid,  unprepossess 
ing — a  man  whose  whole  appearance  somehow  suggested  that 
if  he  only  had  a  cleaver  in  his  hand  and  a  white  apron  on. 
one  would  not  be  at  all  surprised  to  hear  him  say :  "A  mutton 
roast  to-day,  or  will  you  have  a  nice  porterhouse  steak  ?" 

/Napoleon  III.,  the  representative  of  the  highest  modern 
civilization,  progress,  and  refinement;  Abdul  Aziz,  the  repre 
sentative  of  a  people  by  nature  and  training  filthy,  brutish, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  81 

ignorant,     unprogressive,     superstitious — and     a     government  /j 
whose  Three  Graces  are  Tyranny,  Rapacity,  Blood.     Here  in  ; 
brilliant  Paris,  under  this  majestic  Arch  of  Triumph,  the  First  I ( 
Century  greets  the  Nineteenth!) 

NAPOLEON  III.,  Emperor  oTFrance !  Surrounded  by  shout 
ing  thousands,  by  military  pomp,  by  the  splendors  of  his  capi 
tal  city,  and  companioned  by  kings  and  princes — this  is  the  man 
who  was  sneered  at,  and  reviled,  and  called  Bastard — yet  who 
was  dreaming  of  a  crown  and  an  empire  all  the  while ;  who  was 
driven  into  exile — but  carried  his  dreams  with  him;  who 
associated  with  the  common  herd  in  America,  and  ran  foot 
races  for  a  wager — but  still  sat  upon  a  throne,  in  fancy;  who 
braved  every  danger  to  go  to  his  dying  mother — and  grieved 
that  she  could  not  be  spared  to  see  him  cast  aside  his  plebeian 
vestments  for  the  purple  of  royalty;  who  kept  his  faithful 
watch  and  walked  his  weary  beat  a  common  policeman  of  Lon 
don — but  dreamed  the  while  of  a  coming  night  when  he  should 
tread  the  long-drawn  corridors  of  the  Tuileries;  who  made 
the  miserable  fiasco  of  Strasbourg ;  saw  his  poor,  shabby  eagle, 
forgetful  of  its  lesson,  refuse  to  perch  upon  his  shoulder;  de 
livered  his  carefully  prepared,  sententious  burst  of  eloquence 
upon  unsympathetic  ears;  found  himself  a  prisoner,  the  butt 
of  small  wits,  a  mark  for  the  pitiless  ridicule  of  all  the  world 
— yet  went  on  dreaming  of  coronations  and  splendid  pageants 
as  before ;  who  lay  a  forgotten  captive  in  the  dungeons  of  Ham 
— and  still  schemed  and  planned  and  pondered  over  future 
glory  and  future  power;  President  of  France  at  last!  a  coup 
d'etat  and  surrounded  by  applauding  armies,  welcomed  by 
the  thunders  of  cannon,  he  mounts  a  throne  and  waves  before 
an  astounded  world  the  scepter  of  a  mighty  empire !  Who 
talks  of  the  marvels  of  fiction?  Who  speaks  of  the  wonders 
of  romance?  Who  prates  of  the  tame  achievements  of  Aladdin 
and  the  Magi  of  Arabia? 

ABDUL  Aziz,  Sultan  of  Turkey,  Lord  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire !  Born  to  a  throne ;  weak,  stupid,  ignorant,  almost,  as 
his  meanest  slave ;  chief  of  a  vast  royalty,  yet  the  puppet  of 
his  premier  and  the  obedient  child  of  a  tyrannical  mother;  a 
man  who  sits  upon  a  throne — the  beck  of  whose  finger  moves 
navies  and  armies — who  holds  in  his  hands  the  power  of  life 
and  death  over  millions — yet  who  sleeps,  sleeps,  eats,  eats,  idles 
with  his  eight  hundred  concubines,  and  when  he  is  surfeited 
with  eating  and  sleeping  and  idling,  and  would  rouse  up  and 
take  the  reins  of  government  and  threaten  to  be  a  Sultan,  is 


82  MARK  TWAIN 

charmed  from  his  purpose  by  the  wary  Fuad  Pacha  with  a 
pretty  plan  for  a  new  palace  or  a  new  ship — charmed  away 
with  a  new  toy,  like  any  other  restless  child;  a  man  who  sees 
his  people  robbed  and  oppressed  by  soulless  tax-gatherers,  but 
speaks  no  word  to  save  them;  who  believes  in  gnomes  and 
genii  and  the  wild  fables  of  the  Arabian  Nights,  but  has  small 
regard  for  the  mighty  magicians  of  to-day,  and  is  nervous  in 
the  presence  of  their  mysterious  railroads  and  steamboats  and 
telegraphs;  who  would  see  undone  in  Egypt  all  that  great 
Mehemet  Ali  achieved,  and  would  prefer  rather  to  forget  than 
emulate  him;  a  man  who  found  his  great  empire  a  blot  upon 
the  earth — a  degraded,  poverty-stricken,  miserable,  infamous 
agglomeration  of  ignorance,  crime,  and  brutality,  and  will  idle 
away  the  allotted  days  of  his  trivial  life,  and  then  pass  to  the 
dust  and  the  worms  and  leave  it  so ! 

Napoleon  has  augmented  the  commercial  prosperity  of 
France,  in  ten  years,  to  such  a  degree  that  figures  can  hardly 
compute  it.  He  has  rebuilt  Paris,  and  has  partly  rebuilt  every 
city  in  the  state.  He  condemns  a  whole  street  at  a  time, 
assesses  the  damages,  pays  them,  and  rebuilds  superbly.  Then 
speculators  buy  up  the  ground  and  sell,  but  the  original  owner 
is  given  the  first  choice  by  the  government  at  a  stated  price 
before  the  speculator  is  permitted  to  purchase.  But  above 
all  things,  he  has  taken  the  sole  control  of  the  empire  of  France 
into  his  hands,  and  made  it  a  tolerably  free  land — for  people 
who  will  not  attempt  to  go  too  far  in  meddling  with  govern 
ment  affairs.  No  country  offers  greater  security  to  life  and 
property  than  France,  and  one  has  all  the  freedom  he  wants, 
but  no  license — no  license  to  interfere  with  anybody,  or  make 
any  one  uncomfortable. 

As  for  the  Sultan,  one  could  set  a  trap  anywhere  and  catch 
a  dozen  abler  men  in  a  night. 

fTrhe  bands  struck  up,  and  the  brilliant  adventurer,  Napoleon 
ITT.,  the  genius  of  Energy,  Persistence,  Enterprise;  and  the 
feeble  Abdul  Aziz,  the  genius  of  Ignorance,  Bigotry,  and 
Indolence,  prepared  for  the  Forward — MarcnTj 

We  saw  the  splendid  review,  we  saw  the  white-mustached 
old  Crimean  soldier,  Canrobert,  Marshal  of  France,  we  saw — 
well,  we  saw  everything,  and  then  we  went  home  satisfied. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

WE  went  to  see  the  Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame.  We 
had  heard  of  it  before.  It  surprises  me,  some 
times,  to  think  how  much  we  do  know,  and  how 
intelligent  we  are.  We  recognized  the  brown  old  Gothic  pile 
in  a  moment;  it  was  like  the  pictures.  We  stood  at  a  little 
distance  and  changed  from  one  point  of  observation  to  another, 
and  gazed  long  at  its  lofty  square  towers  and  its  rich  front, 
clustered  thick  with  stony,  mutilated  saints  who  had  been  look 
ing  calmly  down  from  their  perches  for  ages.  The  Patriarch 
of  Jerusalem  stood  under  them  in  the  old  days  of  chivalry 
and  romance,  and  preached  the  third  Crusade,  more  than  six 
hundred  years  ago;  and  since  that  day  they  have  stood  there 
and  looked  quietly  down  upon  the  most  thrilling  scenes,  the 
grandest  pageants,  the  most  extraordinary  spectacles  that  have 
grieved  or  delighted  Paris.  These  battered  and  broken-nosed 
old  fellows  saw  many  and  many  a  cavalcade  of  mail-clad 
knights  come  marching  home  from  Holy  Land;  they  heard 
the  bells  above  them  toll  the  signal  for  St.  Bartholomew's 
Massacre,  and  they  saw  the  slaughter  that  followed ;  later,  they 
saw  the  Reign  of  Terror,  the  carnage  of  the  Revolution,  the 
overthrow  of  a  king,  and  the  coronation  of  two  Napoleons, 
the  christening  of  the  young  prince  that  lords  it  over  a  regi 
ment  of  servants  in  the  Tuileries  to-day — and  they  may  pos 
sibly  continue  to  stand  there  until  they  see  the  Napoleon 
dynasty  swept  away  and  the  banners  of  a  great  Republic 
floating  above  its  ruins.  I  wish  these  old  parties  could  speak. 
They  could  tell  a  tale  worth  the  listening  to. 

They  say  that  a  pagan  temple  stood  where  Notre  Dame 
now  stands,  in  the  old  Roman  days,  eighteen  or  twenty 
centuries  ago — remains  of  it  are  still  preserved  in  Paris ;  and 
that  a  Christian  church  took  its  place  about  A.  D.  300 ;  another 
took  the  place  of  that  in  A.  D.  500;  and  that  the  foundations 
of  the  present  cathedral  were  laid  about  A.  D.  1100.  The 
ground  ought  to  be  measurably  sacred  by  this  time,  one  would 
think.  One  portion  of  this  noble  old  edifice  is  suggestive  of 
the  quaint  fashions  of  ancient  times.  It  was  built  by  Jean 

83 


84  MARK  TWAIN 

Sans-Peur,  Duke  of  Burgundy,  to  set  his  conscience  at  rest 
— he  had  assassinated  the  Duke  of  Orleans.  Alas !  those 
good  old  times  are  gone,  when  a  murderer  could  wipe  the 
stain  from  his  name  and  soothe  his  troubles  to  sleep  simply  by 
getting  out  his  bricks  and  mortar  and  building  an  addition 
to  a  church. 

The  portals  of  the  great  western  front  are  bisected  by 
square  pillars.  They  took  the  central  one  away,  in  1852,  on 
the  occasion  of  thanksgivings  for  the  reinstitution  of  the 
Presidential  power — but  precious  soon  they  had  occasion  to 
reconsider  that  motion  and  put  it  back  again !  And  they  did. 

We  loitered  through  the  grand  aisles  for  an  hour  or  two, 
staring  up  at  the  rich  stained-glass  windows  embellished  with 
blue  and  yellow  and  crimson  saints  and  martyrs,  and  trying 
to  admire  the  numberless  great  pictures  in  the  chapels,  and 
then  we  were  admitted  to  the  sacristy  and  shown  the  mag 
nificent  robes  which  the  Pope  wore  when  he  crowned  Napo 
leon  I.;  a  wagon-load  of  solid  gold  and  silver  utensils  used  in 
the  great  public  processions  and  ceremonies  of  the  church; 
some  nails  of  the  true  cross,  a  fragment  of  the  cross  itself,  a 
part  of  the  crown  of  thorns.  We  had  already  seen  a  large 
piece  of  the  true  cross  in  a  church  in  the  Azores,  but  no  nails. 
They  showed  us  likewise  the  bloody  robe  which  that  Arch 
bishop  of  Paris  wore  who  exposed  his  sacred  person  and 
braved  the  wrath  of  the  insurgents  of  1848,  to  mount  the 
barricades  and  hold  aloft  the  olive  branch  of  peace  in  the  hope 
of  stopping  the  slaughter.  His  noble  effort  cost  him  his  life. 
He  was  shot  dead.  They  showed  us  a  cast  of  his  face,  taken 
after  death,  the  bullet  that  killed  him,  and  the  two  vertebrae 
in  which  it  lodged.  These  people  have  a  somewhat  singular 
taste  in  the  matter  of  relics.  Ferguson  told  us  that  the  silver 
cross  which  the  good  archbishop  wore  at  his  girdle  was  seized 
and  thrown  into  the  Seine,  where  it  lay  embedded  in  the  mud 
for  fifteen  years,  and  then  an  angel  appeared  to  a  priest  and 
told  him  where  to  dive  for  it;  he  did  dive  for  it  and  got  it, 
and  now  it  is  there  on  exhibition  at  Notre  Dame,  to  be  in 
spected  by  anybody  who  feels  an  interest  in  inanimate  objects 
of  miraculous  intervention. 

Next  we  went  to  visit  the  Morgue,  that  horrible  receptacle 
for  the  dead  who  die  mysteriously  and  leave  the  manner  of 
their  taking  off  a  dismal  secret.  We  stood  before  a  grating 
and  looked  through  into  a  room  which  was  hung  all  about 
with  the  clothing  of  dead  men;  coarse  blouses,  water-soaked: 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  85 

the  delicate  garments  of  women  and  children;  patrician  vest 
ments,  flecked  and  stabbed  and  stained  with  red;  a  hat  that 
was  crushed  and  bloody.  On  a  slanting  stone  lay  a  drowned 
man,  naked,  swollen,  purple ;  clasping  the  fragment  of  a  broken 
bush  with  a  grip  which  death  had  so  petrified  that  human 
strength  could  not  unloose  it — mute  witness  of  the  last  de 
spairing  effort  to  save  the  life  that  was  doomed  beyond  all 
help.  A  stream  of  water  trickled  ceaselessly  over  the  hideous 
face.  We  knew  that  the  body  and  the  clothing  were  there 
for  identification  by  friends,  but  still  we  wondered  if  anybody 
could  love  that  repulsive  object  or  grieve  for  its  loss.  We 
grew  meditative  and  wondered  if,  some  forty  years  ago, 
when  the  mother  of  that  ghastly  thing  was  dangling  it  upon 
her  knee,  and  kissing  it  and  petting  it  and  displaying  it  with 
satisfied  pride  to  the  passers-by,  a  prophetic  vision  of  this  dread 
ending  ever  flitted  through  her  brain.  I  half  feared  that  the 
mother,  or  the  wife  or  a  brother  of  the  dead  man  might  come 
while  we  stood  there,  but  nothing  of  the  kind  occurred.  Men 
and  women  came,  and  some  looked  eagerly  in,  and  pressed 
their  faces  against  the  bars;  others  glanced  carelessly  at  the 
body,  and  turned  away  with  a  disappointed  look — people,  I 
thought,  who  live  upon  strong  excitements,  and  who  attend 
the  exhibitions  of  the  Morgue  regularly,  just  as  other  people 
go  to  see  theatrical  spectacles  every  night.  When  one  of  these 
looked  in  and  passed  on,  I  could  not  help  thinking — 

"Now  this  don't  afford  you  any  satisfaction — a  party  with 
his  head  shot  off  is  what  you  need." 

One  night  we  went  to  the  celebrated  Jardin  Mabille,  but 
only  stayed  a  little  while.  We  wanted  to  see  some  of  this 
kind  of  Paris  life,  however,  and  therefore  the  next  night  we 
went  to  a  similar  place  of  entertainment  in  a  great  garden  in 
the  suburb  of  Asnieres.  We  went  to  the  railroad  depot, 
toward  evening,  and  Ferguson  got  tickets  for  a  second-class 
carriage.  Such  a  perfect  jam  of  people  I  have  not  often  seen 
— but  there  was  no  noise,  no  disorder,  no  rowdyism.  Some 
of  the  women  and  young  girls  that  entered  the  train  we  knew 
to  be  of  the  demimonde,  but  others  we  were  not  at  all  sure 
about. 

The  girls  and  women  in  our  carriage  behaved  themselves 
modestly  and  becomingly  all  the  way  out,  except  that  they 
smoked.  When  we  arrived  at  the  garden  in  Asnieres,  we 
paid  a  franc  or  two  admission,  and  entered  a  place  which  had 
flower-beds  in  it,  and  grass-plats,  and  long,  curving  rows  of 


86  MARK  TWAIN 

ornamental  shrubbery,  with  here  and  there  a  secluded  bower 
convenient  for  eating  ice-cream  in.  We  moved  along  the 
sinuous  gravel  walks,  with  the  great  concourse  of  girls  and 
young  men,  and  suddenly  a  domed  and  filigreed  white  temple, 
starred  over  and  over  and  over  again  with  brilliant  gas-jets, 
burst  upon  us  like  a  fallen  sun.  Near  by  was  a  large,  hand 
some  house  with  its  ample  front  illuminated  in  the  same  way, 
and  above  its  roof  floated  the  Star-Spangled  Banner  of 
America. 

"Well!"  I  said.  "How  is  this?"  It  nearly  took  my  breath 
away. 

Ferguson  said  an  American — a  New-Yorker — kept  the  place, 
and  was  carrying  on  quite  a  stirring  opposition  to  the  Jardin 
Mabille. 

Crowds,  composed  of  both  sexes  and  nearly  all  ages,  were 
frisking  about  the  garden  or  sitting  in  the  open  air  in  front 
of  the  flagstaff  and  the  temple,  drinking  wine  and  coffee,  or 
smoking.  The  dancing  had  not  begun  yet.  Ferguson  said 
there  was  to  be  an  exhibition.  The  famous  Blondin  was 
going  to  perform  on  a  tight  rope  in  another  part  of  the  garden. 
We  went  thither.  Here  the  light  was  dim,  and  the  masses 
of  people  were  pretty  closely  packed  together.  And  now  I 
made  a  mistake  which  any  donkey  might  make,  but  a  sensible 
man  never.  I  committed  an  error  which  I  find  myself  re 
peating  every  day  of  my  life.  Standing  right  before  a  young 
lady,  I  said : 

"Dan,  just  look  at  this  girl,  how  beautiful  she  is !" 

"I  thank  you  more  for  the  evident  sincerity  of  the  compli 
ment,  sir,  than  for  the  extraordinary  publicity  you  have  given 
to  it!"  This  in  good,  pure  English. 

We  took  a  walk,  but  my  spirits  were  very,  very  sadly 
dampened.  I  did  not  feel  right  comfortable  for  some  time 
afterward.  Why  will  people  be  so  stupid  as  to  suppose  them 
selves  the  only  foreigners  among  a  crowd  of  ten  thousand 
persons  ? 

But  Blondin  came  out  shortly.  He  appeared  on  a  stretched 
cable,  far  away  above  the  sea  of  tossing  hats  and  handker 
chiefs,  and  in  the  glare  of  the  hundreds  of  rockets  that  whizzed 
heavenward  by  him  he  looked  like  a  wee  insect.  He  balanced 
his  pole  and  walked  the  length  of  his  rope — two  or  three  hun 
dred  feet ;  he  came  back  and  got  a  man  and  carried  him  across ; 
he  returned  to  the  center  and  danced  a  jig;  next  he  performed 
some  gymnastic  and  balancing  feats  too  perilous  to  afford  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  87 

pleasant  spectacle;  and  he  finished  by  fastening  to  his  person 
a  thousand  Roman  candles,  Catherine  wheels,  serpents  and 
rockets  of  all  manner  of  brilliant  colors,  setting  them  on  fire 
all  at  once  and  walking  and  waltzing  across  his  rope  again  'in 
a  blinding  blaze  of  glory  that  lit  up  the  garden  and  the  people's 
faces  like  a  great  conflagration  at  midnight. 

The  dance  had  begun,  and  we  adjourned  to  the  temple. 
Within  it  was  a  drinking-saloon ;  and  all  around  it  was  a  broad 
circular  platform  for  the  dancers.  I  backed  up  against  the 
wall  of  the  temple,  and  waited.  Twenty  sets  formed,  the 
music  struck  up,  and  then — I  placed  my  hands  before  my  face 
for  very  shame.  But  I  looked  through  my  fingers.  They  were 
dancing  the  renowned  "Can-can."  A  handsome  girl  in  the 
set  before  me  tripped  forward  lightly  to  meet  the  opposite 
gentleman — tripped  back  again,  grasped  her  dresses  vigorously 
on  both  sides  with  her  hands,  raised  them  pretty  high,  danced 
an  extraordinary  jig  that  had  more  activity  and  exposure  about 
it  than  any  jig  I  ever  saw  before,  and  then,  drawing  her  clothes 
still  higher,  she  advanced  gaily  to  the  center  and  launched  a 
vicious  kick  full  at  her  vis-a-vis  that  must  infallibly  have  re 
moved  his  nose  if  he  had  been  seven  feet  high.  It  was  a  mercy 
he  was  only  six. 

That  is  the  Can-can.  The  idea  of  it  is  to  dance  as  wildly, 
as  noisily,  as  furiously  as  you  can;  expose  yourself  as  much 
as  possible  if  you  are  a  woman ;  and  kick  as  high  as  you  can,  no 
matter  which  sex  you  belong  to.  There  is  no  word  of  exag 
geration  in  this.  Any  of  the  staid,  respectable,  aged  people 
who  were  there  that  night  can  testify  to  the  truth  of  that 
statement.  There  were  a  good  many  such  people  present.  I 
suppose  French  morality  is  not  of  that  strait-laced  description 
which  is  shocked  at  trifles. 

I  moved  aside  and  took  a  general  view  of  the  Can-can.  Shouts, 
laughter,  furious  music,  a  bewildering  chaos  of  darting  and 
intermingling  forms,  stormy  jerking  and  snatching  of  gay 
dresses,  bobbing  heads,  flying  arms,  lightning  flashes  of  white- 
stockinged  calves  and  dainty  slippers  in  the  air,  and  then  a 
grand  final  rush,  riot,  a  terrific  hubbub,  and  a  wild  stampede ! 
Heavens  !  Nothing  like  it  has  been  seen  on  earth  since  trembling 
Tam  O'Shanter  saw  the  devil  and  the  witches  at  their  orgies 
that  stormy  night  in  "Allo way's  auld  haunted  kirk." 

We  visite^  the  Louvre,  at  a  time  when  we  had  no  silk 
purchases  in  view,  and  looked  at  its  miles  of  paintings  by  the 
old  masters.  Some  of  them  were  beautiful,  but  at  the  same 


88  MARK  TWAIN 

time  they  carried  such  evidences  about  them  of  the  cringing 
spirit  of  those  great  men  that  we  found  small  pleasure  in  ex 
amining  them.  Their  nauseous  adulation  of  princely  patrons 
was  more  prominent  to  me  and  chained  my  attention  more 
surely  than  the  charms  of  color  and  expression  which  are 
claimed  to  be  in  the  pictures.  Gratitude  for  kindnesses  is  well, 
but  it  seems  to  me  that  some  of  those  artists  carried  it  so 
far  that  it  ceased  to  be  gratitude,  and  became  worship.  If  there 
is  a  plausible  excuse  for  the  worship  of  men,  then  by  all 
means  let  us  forgive  Rubens  and  his  brethren. 

But  I  will  drop  the  subject,  lest  I  say  something  about 
the  old  masters  that  might  as  well  be  left  unsaid. 

Of  course  we  drove  in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  that  limitless 
park,  with  its  forests,  its  lakes,  its  cascades,  and  its  broad 
avenues.  There  were  thousands  upon  thousands  of  vehicles 
abroad,  and  the  scene  was  full  of  life  and  gaiety.  There  were 
very  common  hacks,  with  father  and  mother  and  all  the  chil 
dren  in  them ;  conspicuous  little  open  carriages  with  celebrated 
ladies  of  questionable  reputation  in  them ;  there  were  Dukes 
and  Duchesses  abroad,  with  gorgeous  footmen  perched  be 
hind,  and  equally  gorgeous  outriders  perched  on  each  of  the 
six  horses ;  there  were  blue  and  silver,  and  green  and  gold,  and 
pink  and  black,  and  all  sorts  and  descriptions  of  stunning 
and  startling  liveries  out,  and  I  almost  yearned  to  be  a  flunkey 
myself,  for  the  sake  of  the  fine  clothes. 

But  presently  the  Emperor  came  along  and  he  outshone 
them  all.  He  was  preceded  by  a  body-guard  of  gentlemen  on 
horseback  in  showy  uniforms,  his  carriage-horses  (there  ap 
peared  to  be  somewhere  in  the  remote  neighborhood  of  a 
thousand  of  them)  were  bestridden  by  gallant-looking  fellows, 
also  in  stylish  uniforms,  and  after  the  carriage  followed  an 
other  detachment  of  body-guards.  Everybody  got  out  of  the  < 
way;  everybody  bowed  to  the  Emperor  and  his  friend  the 
Sultan,  and  they  went  by  on  a  swinging  trot  and  disappeared. 

I  will  not  describe  the  Bois  de  Boulogne.  I  cannot  do  it. 
It  is  simply  a  beautiful,  cultivated,  endless,  wonderful  wilder 
ness.  It  is  an  enchanting  place.  It  is  in  Paris,  now,  one  may 
say,  but  a  crumbling  old  cross  in  one  portion  of  it  reminds  one 
that  it  was  not  always  so.  The  cross  marks  the  spot  where  a 
celebrated  troubadour  was  waylaid  and  murdered  in  the  four 
teenth  century.  It  was  in'  this  park  that  that  fellow  with  an 
unpronounceable  name  made  the  attempt  upon  the  Russian 
Czar's  life  last  spring  with  a  pistol.  The  bullet  struck  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  89 


'  • 

tree.     Ferguson  showed  us  the  place.  /Now  in  America  that  , 
interesting  tree  would  be  chopped  down  or  forgotten  within  j 
the    next   five   years,    but    it   will    be    treasured    here.      The  1 
guides  will  point  it  out  to  visitors  for  the  next  eight  hundred  J  j 
years,  and  when  it  decays  and  falls  down  they  will  put  up  an-/  j 
other  there  and  go  on  with  the  same  old  story  just  the  same!S 


CHAPTER  XV 

ONE  of  our  pleasantest  visits  was  to  Pere  la  Chaise, 
the  national  burying-ground  of  France,  the  honored 
resting-place  of  some  of  her  greatest  and  best  children, 
the  last  home  of  scores  of  illustrious  men  and  women  who 
were  born  to  no  titles,  but  achieved  fame  by  their  own  energy 
and  their  own  genius.  It  is  a  solemn  city  of  winding  streets, 
and  of  miniature  marble  temples  and  mansions  of  the  dead 
gleaming  white  from  out  a  wilderness  of  foliage  and  fresh 
flowers.  Not  every  city  is  so  well  peopled  as  this,  or  has  so 
ample  an  area  within  its  walls.  Few  palaces  exist  in  any  city 
that  are  so  exquisite  in  design,  so  rich  in  art,  so  costly  in 
material,  so  graceful,  so  beautiful. 

We  stood  in  the  ancient  church  of  St.  Denis,  where  the 
marble  effigies  of  thirty  generations  of  kings  and  queens  lay 
stretched  at  length  upon  the  tombs,  and  the  sensations  invoked 
were  startling  and  novel;  the  curious  armor,  the  obsolete  cos 
tumes,  the  placid  faces,  the  hands  placed  palm  to  palm  in  elo 
quent  supplication — it  was  a  vision  of  gray  antiquity.  It 
seemed  curious  enough  to  be  standing  face  to  face,  as  it  were, 
with  old  Dagobert  I.,  and  Clovis  and  Charlemagne,  those 
vague,  colossal  heroes,  those  shadows,  those  myths  of  a  thou 
sand  years  ago!  I  touched  their  dust-covered  faces  with  my 
finger,  but  Dagobert  was  deader  than  the  sixteen  centuries  that 
have  passed  over  him,  Clovis  slept  well  after  his  labor  for, 
Christ,  and  old  Charlemagne  went  on  dreaming  of  his  paladins, 
of  bloody  Roncesvalles,  and  gave  no  heed  to  me. 

The  great  names  of  Pere  la  Chaise  impress  one,  too,  but 
differently.  There  the  suggestion  brought  constantly  to  his 
mind  is,  that  this  place  is  sacred  to  a  nobler  royalty — the 
royalty  of  heart  and  brain.  Every  faculty  of  mind,  every  noble 
trait  of  human  nature,  every  high  occupation  which  men  en 
gage  in,  seems  represented  by  a  famous  name.  The  effect  is 
a  curious  medley.  Davoust  and  Massena,  who  wrought  in 
many  a  battle-tragedy,  are  here,  and  so  also  is  Rachel,  of 
equal  renown  in  mimic  tragedy  on  the  stage.  The  Abbe 
Sicard  sleeps  here — the  first  great  teacher  of  the  deaf  and 

90 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  91 

dumb — a  man  whose  heart  went  out  to  every  unfortunate,  and 
whose  life  was  given  to  kindly  offices  in  their  service;  and  not 
far  off,  in  repose  and  peace  at  last,  lies  Marshal  Ney,  whose 
stormy  spirit  knew  no  music  like  the  bugle-call  to  arms.  The 
man  who  originated  public  gas-lighting,  and  that  other  bene 
factor  who  introduced  the  cultivation  of  the  potato  and  thus 
blessed  millions  of  his  starving  countrymen,  lie  with  the 
Prince  of  Masserano,  and  with  exiled  queens  and  princes  of 
Further  India.  Gay-Lussac,  the  chemist;  Laplace,  the  astron 
omer;  Larrey,  the  surgeon;  de  Seze,  the  advocate,  are  here, 
and  with  them  are  Talma,  Bellini,  Rubini ;  de  Balzac,  Beaumar- 
chais,  Beranger;  Moliere  and  Lafontaine,  and  scores  of  other 
men  whose  names  and  whose  worthy  labors  are  as  familiar 
in  the  remote  by-places  of  civilization  as  are  the  historic  deeds 
of  the  kings  and  princes  that  sleep  in  the  marble  vaults  of  St. 
Denis. 

But  among  the  thousands  and  thousands  of  tombs  in  Pere 
la  Chaise,  there  is  one  that  no  man,  no  woman,  no  youth  of 
either  sex,  ever  passes  by  without  stopping  to  examine.  Every 
visitor  has  a  sort  of  indistinct  idea  of  the  history  of  its  dead, 
and  comprehends  that  homage  is  due  there,  but  not  one  in 
twenty  thousand  clearly  remembers  the  story  of  that  tomb 
and  its  romantic  occupants.  This  is  the  grave  of  Abelard  and 
Heloise — a  grave  which  has  been  more  revered,  more  widely 
known,  more  written  and  sung  about  and  wept  over,  for 
seven  hundred  years,  than  any  other  in  Christendom,  save  only 
that  of  the  Saviour.  All  visitors  linger  pensively  about  it ;  all 
young  people  capture  and  carry  away  keepsakes  and  me 
mentoes  of  it;  all  Parisian  youths  and  maidens  who  are  dis 
appointed  in  love  come  there  to  bail  out  when  they  are  full 
of  tears ;  yea,  many  stricken  lovers  make  pilgrimages  to  this 
shrine  from  distant  provinces  to  weep  and  wail  and  "grit"  their 
teeth  over  their  heavy  sorrows,  and  to  purchase  the  sympathies 
of  the  chastened  spirits  of  that  tomb  with  offerings  of  im 
mortelles  and  budding  flowers. 

Go  when  you  will,  you  will  find  somebody  snuffling  over 
that  tomb.  Go  when  you  will,  you  find  it  furnished  with  those 
bouquets  and  immortelles.  Go  when  you  will,  you  find  a 
gravel-train  from  Marseilles  arriving  to  supply  the  deficiencies 
caused  by  memento-cabbaging  vandals  whose  affections  have 
miscarried. 

Yet  who  really  knows  the  story  of  Abelard  and  Heloise? 
Precious  few  people.  The  names  are  perfectly  familiar  to 


92  MARK  TWAIN 

everybody,  and  that  is  about  all.  With  infinite  pains  I  have 
acquired  a  knowledge  of  that  history,  and  I  propose  to  narrate 
it  here,  partly  for  the  honest  information  of  the  public  and 
partly  to  show  that  public  that  they  have  been  wasting  a  good 
deal  of  marketable  sentiment  very  unnecessarily. 


STORY    OF    ABELARD    AND    HELOISE 

Heloise  was  born  seven  hundred  and  sixty-six  years  ago. 
She  may  have  had  parents.  There  is  no  telling.  She  lived 
with  her  uncle  Fulbert,  a  canon  of  the  cathedral  of  Paris.  I 
do  not  know  what  a  canon  of  a  cathedral  is,  but  that  is  what 
he  was.  He  was  nothing  more  than  a  sort  of  a  mountain 
howitzer,  likely,  because  they  had  no  heavy  artillery  in  those 
clays.  Suffice  it,  then,  that  Heloise  lived  with  her  uncle  the 
howitzer,  and  was  happy.  She  spent  the  most  of  her  child 
hood  in  the  convent  of  Argenteuil — never  heard  of  Argenteuil 
before,  but  suppose  there  was  really  such  a  place.  She  then 
returned  to  her  uncle,  the  old  gun,  or  son  of  a  gun,  as  the 
case  may  be,  and  he  taught  her  to  write  and  speak  Latin,  which 
was  the  language  of  literature  and  polite  society  at  that  period. 

Just  at  this  time,  Pierre  Abelard,  who  had  already  made 
himself  widely  famous  as  a  rhetorician,  came  to  found  a 
school  of  rhetoric  in  Paris.  The  originality  of  his  principles, 
his  eloquence,  and  his  great  physical  strength  and  beauty 
created  a  profound  sensation.  He  saw  Heloise,  and  was  capti 
vated  by  her  blooming  youth,  her  beauty,  and  her  charming 
disposition.  He  wrote  to  her ;  she  answered.  He  wrote  again, 
she  answered  again.  He  was  now  in  love.  He  longed  to 
know  her — to  speak  to  her  face  to  face. 

His  school  was  near  Fulbert's  house.  He  asked  Fulbert 
to  allow  him  to  call.  The  good  old  swivel  saw  here  a  rare 
opportunity;  his  niece,  whom  he  so  much  loved,  would  absorb 
knowledge  from  this  man,  and  it  would  not  cost  him  a  cent. 
Such  was  Fulbert — penurious. 

Fulbert's  first  name  is  not  mentioned  by  any  author,  which 
is  unfortunate.  However,  George  W.  Fulbert  will  answer  for 
him  as  well  as  any  other.  We  will  let  him  go  at  that.  He  asked 
Abelard  to  teach  her. 

Abelard  was  glad  enough  of  the  opportunity.  He  came 
often  and  stayed  long.  A  letter  of  his  shows  in  its  very  first 
sentence  that  he  came  under  that  friendly  roof,  like  a  cold- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  93 

hearted   villain  as   he  was,  with  the  deliberate   intention  of 
debauching  a  confiding,  innocent  girl.     This  is  the  letter : 

I  cannot  cease  to  be  astonished  at  the  simplicity  of  Fulbert;  I 
was  as  much  surprised  as  if  he  had  placed  a  lamb  in  the  power  of  a 
hungry  wolf.  Heloise  and  I,  under  the  pretext  of  study,  gave  ourselves 
up  wholly  to  love,  and  the  solitude  that  love  seeks  our  studies  pro 
cured  for  us.  Books  were  open  before  us,  but  we  spoke  oftener  of 
love  than  philosophy,  and  kisses  came  more  readily  from  our  lips  than 
words. 

And  so,  exulting  over  an  honorable  confidence  which  to 
his  degraded  instinct  was  a  ludicrous  "simplicity,"  this  un 
manly  Abelard  seduced  the  niece  of  the  man  whose  guest  he 
was.  Paris  found  it  out.  Fulbert  was  told  of  it — told  often— 
but  refused  to  believe  it.  He  could  not  comprehend  how  a 
man  could  be  so  depraved  as  to  use  the  sacred  protection  and 
security  of  hospitality  as  a  means  for  the  commission  of  such 
a  crime  as  that.  But  when  he  heard  the  rowdies  in  the  streets 
singing  the  love  songs  of  Abelard  to  Heloise,  the  case  was 
too  plain — love  songs  come  not  properly  within  the  teachings 
of  rhetoric  and  philosophy. 

He  drove  Abelard  from  his  house.  Abelard  returned 
secretly  and  carried  Heloise  away  to  Palais,  in  Brittany,  his 
native  country.  Here,  shortly  afterward,  she  bore  a  son,  who, 
from  his  rare  beauty,  was  surnamed  Astrolabe — William  G. 
The  girl's  flight  enraged  Fulbert,  and  he  longed  for  vengeance, 
but  feared  to  strike  lest  retaliation  visit  Heloise — for  he  still 
loved  her  tenderly.  At  length  Abelard  offered  to  marry  Heloise 
— but  on  a  shameful  condition:  that  the  marriage  should  be 
kept  secret  from  the  world,  to  the  end  that  (while  her  good 
name  remained  a  wreck,  as  before)  his  priestly  reputation 
might  be  kept  untarnished.  It  was  like  that  miscreant.  Ful 
bert  saw  his  opportunity  and  consented.  He  would  see  the 
parties  married,  and  then  violate  the  confidence  of  the  man 
who  had  taught  him  that  trick;  he  would  divulge  the  secret 
and  so  remove  somewhat  of  the  obloquy  that  attached  to  his 
niece's  fame.  But  the  niece  suspected  his  scheme.  She  re 
fused  the  marriage  at  first ;  she  said  Fulbert  would  betray  the 
secret  to  save  her,  and  besides,  she  did  not  wish  to  drag  down 
a  lover  who  was  so  gifted,  so  honored  by  the  world,  who  had 
such  a  splendid  career  before  him.  It  was  noble,  self -sacri 
ficing  love,  and  characteristic  of  the  pure-souled  Heloise, 
but  it  was  not  good  sense. 


94  MARK  TWAIN 

But  she  was  overruled,  and  the  private  marriage  took  place, 
Now  for  Fulbert !  The  heart  so  wounded  should  be  healed  at 
last;  the  proud  spirit  so  tortured  should  find  rest  again;  the 
humbled  head  should  be  lifted  up  once  more.  He  proclaimed 
the  marriage  in  the  high  places  of  the  city,  and  rejoiced  that 
dishonor  had  departed  from  his  house.  But  lo !  Abelard  de 
nied  the  marriage!  Heloise  denied  it.  The  people,  knowing 
the  former  circumstances,  might  have  believed  Fulbert,  had 
only  Abelard  denied  it,  but  when  the  person  chiefly  interested 
— the  girl  herself — denied  it,  they  laughed  despairing  Fulbert 
to  scorn. 

The  poor  canon  of  the  cathedral  of  Paris  was  spiked  again. 
The  last  hope  of  repairing  the  wrong  that  had  been  done  his 
house  was  gone.  What  next?  Human  nature  suggested  re 
venge.  He  compassed  it.  The  historian  says : 

Ruffians,  hired  by  Fulbert,  fell  upon  Abelard  by  night,  and  in 
flicted  upon  him  a  terrible  and  nameless  mutilation. 

I  am  seeking  the  last  resting-place  of  those  "ruffians." 
When  I  find  it  I  shall  shed  some  tears  on  it,  and  stack  up  some 
bouquets  and  immortelles,  and  cart  away  from  it  some  gravel 
whereby  to  remember  that  howsoever  blotted  by  crime  their 
lives  may  have  been,  these  ruffians  did  one  just  deed,  at  any 
rate,  albeit  it  was  not  warranted. by 'the  strict  letter  of  the  law. 

Heloise  entered  a  convent  and  gave  good-by  to  the  world 
and  its  pleasures  for  all  time.  For  twelve  years  she  never 
heard  of  Abelard — never  even  heard  his  name  mentioned.  She 
had  become  prioress  of  Argenteuil,  and  led  a  life  of  complete 
seclusion.  She  happened  one  day  to  see  a  letter  written  by 
him,  in  which  he  narrated  his  own  history.  She  cried  over  it, 
and  wrote  him.  He  answered,  addressing  her  as  his  "sister  i 
in  Christ."  They  continued  to  correspond,  she  in  the  un- 
weighed  language  of  unwavering  affection,  he  in  the  chilly 
phraseology  of  the  polished  rhetorician.  She  poured  out  her 
heart  in  passionate,  disjointed  sentences;  he  replied  writh  fin 
ished  essays,  divided  deliberately  into  heads  and  subheads, 
premises  and  argument.  She  showered  upon  him  the  tenderest 
epithets  that  love  could  devise,  he  addressed  her  from  the  North 
Pole  of  his  frozen  heart  as  the  "Spouse  of  Christ!"  The 
abandoned  villain! 

On  account  of  her  too  easy  government  of  her  nuns,  some 
disreputable  irregularities  were  discovered  among  them,  and 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  95 

the  Abbot  of  St.  Denis  broke  up  her  establishment.  Abelard 
was  the  official  head  of  the  monastery  of  St.  Gildas  de  Ruys, 
at  that  time,  and  when  he  heard  of  her  homeless  condition  a 
sentiment  of  pity  was  aroused  in  his  breast  (it  is  a  wonder 
the  unfamiliar  emotion  did  not  blow  his  head  off),  and  he 
placed  her  and  her  troop  in  the  little  oratory  of  the  Paraclete, 
a  religious  establishment  which  he  had  founded.  She  had 
many  privations  and  sufferings  to  undergo  at  first,  but  her 
worth  and  her  gentle  disposition  won  influential  friends  for 
her,  and  she  built  up  a  wealthy  and  flourishing  nunnery. 
She  became  a  great  favorite  with  the  heads  of  the  church,  and 
also  the  people,  though  she  seldom  appeared  in  public.  She 
rapidly  advanced  in  esteem,  in  good  report  and  in  usefulness, 
and  Abelard  as  rapidly  lost  ground.  The  Pope  so  honored 
her  that  he  made  her  the  head  of  her  order.  Abelard,  a  man 
.of  splendid  talents,  and  ranking  as  the  first  debater  of  his 
time,  became  timid,  irresolute,  and  distrustful  of  his  powers. 
He  only  needed  a  great  misfortune  to  topple  him  from  the 
high  position  he  held  in  the  world  of  intellectual  excellence,  and 
it  came.  Urged  by  kings  and  princes  to  meet  the  subtle  St. 
Bernard  in  debate  and  crush  him,  he  stood  up  in  the  presence 
of  a  royal  and  illustrious  assemblage,  and  when  his  antagonist 
had  finished  he  looked  about  him,  and  stammered  a  commence 
ment  ;  but  this  courage  failed  him,  the  cunning  of  'his  tongue 
was  gone ;  with  his  speech  unspoken,  he  trembled  and  sat  down, 
a  disgraced  and  vanquished  champion. 

He  died  a  nobody,  and  was  buried  at  Cluny,  A.  D.  1144. 
They  removed  his  body  to  the  Paraclete  afterward,  and  when 
Heloise  died,  twenty  years  later,  they  buried  her  with  him, 
in  accordance  with  her  last  wish.  He  died  at  the  ripe  age  of 
64,  and  she  at  63.  After  the  bodies  had  remained  entombed 
three  hundred  years,  they  were  removed  once  more.  They 
were  removed  again  in  1800,  and  finally,  seventeen  years  after 
ward,  they  were  taken  up  and  transferred  to  Pere  la  Chaise, 
where  they  will  remain  in  peace  and  quiet  until  it  comes  time 
for  them  to  get  up  and  move  again. 

History  is  silent  concerning  the  last  acts  of  the  mountain 
howitzer.  Let  the  world  say  what  it  will  about  him,  I,  at  least, 
shall  always  respect  the  memory  and  sorrow  for  the  abused 
trust,  and  the  broken  heart,  and  the  troubled  spirit  of  the  old 
smooth  bore.  Rest  and  repose  be  his  ! 

Such  is  the  story  of  Abelard  and  Heloise.  Such  is  the 
history  that  Lamartine  has  shed  such  cataracts  of  tears  over. 


96  MARK  TWAIN 

But  that  man  never  could  come  within  the  influence  of  a  sub 
ject  in  the  least  pathetic  without  overflowing  his  banks.  He 
ought  to  be  dammed — or  leveed,  I  should  more  properly  say. 
Such  is  the  history — not  as  it  is  usually  told,  but  as  it  is  when 
stripped  of  the  nauseous  sentimentality  that  would  enshrine  for 
our  loving  worship  a  dastardly  seducer  like  Pierre  Abelard. 
I  have  not  a  word  to  say  against  the  misused,  faithful  girl, 
and  would  not  withhold  from  her  grave  a  single  one  of  those 
simple  tributes  which  blighted  youths  and  maidens  offer  to 
her  memory,  but  I  am  sorry  enough  that  I  have  not  time  and 
opportunity  to  write  four  or  five  volumes  of  my  opinion  of 
her  friend  the  founder  of  the  Parachute,  or  the  Paraclete,  or 
whatever  it  was. 

The  tons  of  sentiment  I  have  wasted  on  that  unprincipled 
humbug,  in  my  ignorance!  I  shall  throttle  down  my  emotions 
hereafter,  about  this  sort  of  people,  until  I  have  read  them  up 
and  know  whether  they  are  entitled  to  any  tearful  attentions  or 
not.  I  wish  I  had  my  immortelles  back,  now,  and  that  bunch  of 
radishes. 

In  Paris  we  often  saw  in  shop  windows  the  sign,  "'English 
Spoken  Here,"  just  as  one  sees  in  the  windows  at  home  the 
sign,  "Id  on  parle  frangaise"  We  always  invaded  these 
places  at  once — and  invariably  received  the  information, 
framed  in  faultless  French,  that  the  clerk  who  did  the  English 
for  the  establishment  had  just  gone  to  dinner  and  would  be 
back  in  an  hour — would  Monsieur  buy  something?  We  won 
dered  why  those  parties  happened  to  take  their  dinners  at  such 
erratic  and  extraordinary  hours,  for  we  never  called  at  a  time 
when  an  exemplary  Christian  would  be  in  the  least  likely  to 
be  abroad  on  such  an  errand.  The  truth  was,  it  was  a  base 
fraud — a  snare  to  trap  the  unwary — chaff  to  catch  fledglings 
with.  They  had  no  English-murdering  clerk.  They  trusted 
to  the  sign  to  inveigle  foreigners  into  their  lairs,  and  trusted 
to  their  own  blandishments  to  keep  them  there  till  they  bought 
something. 

We  ferreted  out  another  French  imposition — a  frequent 
sign  to  this  effect:  "ALL  MANNER  OF  AMERICAN  DRINKS 
ARTISTICALLY  PREPARED  HERE."  We  procured  the  services 
of  a  gentleman  experienced  in  the  nomenclature  of  the  Amer 
ican  bar,  and  moved  upon  the  works  of  one  of  these  imposters, 
A  bowing,  aproned  Frenchman  skipped  forward  and  sajd : 

"Que  voulcz  les  messieurs?"  I  do  not  know  what  "Que 
voulcz  les  messieurs"  means,  but  such  was  his  remark. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  97 

Our  general  said,  "We  will  take  a  whisky-straight." 

[A  stare  from  the  Frenchman.] 

"Well,  if  you  don't  know  what  that  is,  give  us  a  champagne 
cocktail.'* 

[A  stare  and  a  shrug.] 

"Well,  then,  give  us  a  sherry  cobbler." 

The  Frenchman  was  checkmated.  This  was  all  Greek  to 
him. 

"Give  us  a  brandy  smash!" 

The  Frenchman  began  to  back  away,  suspicious  of  the 
ominous  vigor  of  the  last  order — began  to  back  away,  shrug 
ging  his  shoulders  and  spreading  his  hands  apologetically. 

The  General  followed  him  up  and  gained  a  complete  victory. 
The  uneducated  foreigner  could  not  even  furnish  a  Santa  Cruz 
Punch,  an  Eye-Opener,  a  Stone-Fence,  or  an  Earthquake.  It 
.was  plain  that  he  was  a  wicked  impostor. 

An  acquaintance  of  mine  said,  the  other  day,  that  he  was 
doubtless  the  only  American  visitor  to  the  Exposition  who  had 
had  the  high  honor  of  being  escorted  by  the  Emperor's  body 
guard.  I  said  with  unobtrusive  frankness  that  I  was  astonished 
that  such  a  long-legged,  lantern- jawed,  unprepossessing-look 
ing  specter  as  he  should  be  singled  out  for  a  distinction  like  that, 
and  asked  how  it  came  about.  He  said  he  had  attended  a  great 
military  review  in  the  Champ  de  Mars,  some  time  ago,  and 
while  the  multidude  about  him  was  growing  thicker  and  thicker 
every  moment,  he  observed  an  open  space  inside  the  railing 
He  left  his  carriage  and  went  into  it.  He  was  the  only  person 
there,  and  so  he  had  plenty  of  room,  and  the  situation  being 
central,  he  could  see  all  the  preparations  going  on  about  the 
field.  By  and  by  there  was  a  sound  of  music,  and  soon  the 
Emperor  of  the  French  and  the  Emperor  of  Austria,  escorted 
by  the  famous  Cent  Gardes,  entered  the  inclosure.  J^They 
seemed  not  to  observe  him,  but  directly,  in  reponse  to  a  sign 
from  the  commander  of  the  Guard,  a  young  lieutenant  came 
toward  him  with  a  file  of  his  men  following,  halted,  raised  his 
hand  and  gave  the  military  salute,  and  then  said  in  a  low  voice 
that  he  was  sorry  to  have  to  disturb  a  stranger  and  a  gentleman, 
but  the  place  was  sacred  to  royalty.  Then  this  New  Jersey 
phantom  rose  up  and  bowed  and  begged  pardon,  then  with  the 
officer  beside  him,  the  file  of  men  marching  behind  him,  and 
with  every  mark  of  respect,  he  was  escorted  to  his  carriage 
by  the  imperial  Cent  Gardes !  The  officer  saluted  again  and  fell 
back,  the  New  Jersey  sprite  bowed  in  return  and  had  presence 


98  MARK  TWAIN 

(of  mind  enough  to  pretend  that  he  had  simply  called  on  a  matter 
of  private  business  with  those  emperors,  and  so  waved  them  an 
adieu,  and  drove  from  the  field! 
Imagine  a  poor  Frenchman  ignorantly  intruding  upon  a 
public  rostrum  sacred  to  some  sixpenny  dignitary  in  America. 
The  police  would  scare  him  to  death,  first,  with  a  storm  of 
their  elegant  blasphemy,  and  then  pull  him  to  pieces  getting 
him  away  from  there.  We  are  measurably  superior  to  the 
French  in  some  things,  but  they  are  immeasurably  our  betters 
in  others!) 

Enough  of  Paris  for  the  present.  We  have  done  our  whole 
duty  by  it.  We  have  seen  the  Tuileries,  the  Napoleon  Column, 
the  Madelene,  that  wonder  of  wonders  the  tomb  of  Napoleon, 
all  the  great  churches  and  museums,  libraries,  imperial  palaces, 
and  sculpture  and  picture  galleries,  the  Pantheon,  Jardin  des 
Plantes,  the  opera,  the  circus,  the  legislative  body,  the  billiard- 
rooms,  the  barbers,  the  grisettes — 

Ah,  the  grisettes !  I  had  almost  forgotten.  They  are 
another  romantic  fraud.  They  were  (if  you  let  the  books  of 
travel  tell  it)  always  so  beautiful — so  neat  and  trim,  so  graceful 
— so  nai've  and  trusting — so  gentle,  so  winning — so  faithful 
to  their  shop  duties,  so  irresistible  to  buyers  in  their  prattling 
importunity — so  devoted  to  their  poverty-stricken  students  of 
the  Latin  Quarter — so  light-hearted  and  happy  on  their  Sunday 
picnics  in  the  suburbs — and  oh,  so  charmingly,  so  delightfully 
immoral ! 

Stuff !    For  three  or  four  days  I  was  constantly  saying : 
"Quick,  Ferguson !  is  that  a  grisette  ?" 
And  he  always  said  "No." 

He  comprehended,  at  last,  that  I  wanted  to  see  a  grisette. 
Then  he  showed  me  dozens  of  them.  They  were  like  nearly; 
all  the  Frenchwomen  I  ever  saw — homely.  They  had  large 
hands,  large  feet,  large  mouths ;  they  had  pug-noses  as  a  general 
thing,  and  mustaches  that  not  even  good  breeding  could  over 
look;  they  combed  their  hair  straight  back  without  parting; 
they  were  ill-shaped,  they  were  not  winning,  they  were  not 
graceful ;  I  knew  by  their  looks  that  they  ate  garlic  and  onions ; 
and  lastly  and  finally,  to  my  thinking  it  would  be  base  flattery 
to  call  them  immoral. 

Aroint  thee,  wench!  .1  sorrow  for  the  vagabond  student 
of  the  Latin  Quarter  now,  even  more  than  formerly  I  envied 
him.  Thus  topples  to  earth  another  idol  of  my  infancy. 

We  have  seen  everything,  and  to-morrow  we  go  to  Versailles. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  99 

We  shall  see  Paris  only  for  a  little  while  as  we  come  back  to 
take  up  our  line  of  march  for  the  ship,  and  so  I  may  as  well 
bid  the  beautiful  city  a  regretful  farewell.  We  shall  travel 
many  thousands  of  miles  after  we  leave  here,  and  visit  many 
great  cities,  but  we  shall  find  none  so  enchanting  as  this. 

Some  of  our  party  have  gone  to  England,  intending  to  take 
a  roundabout  course  and  rejoin  the  vessel  at  Leghorn  or  Naples, 
several  weeks  hence.  We  came  near  going  to  Geneva,  but  have 
concluded  to  return  to  Marseilles  and  go  up  through  Italy 
from  Genoa. 

I  will  conclude  this  chapter  with  a  remark  that  I  am  sincerely 
proud  to  be  able  to  make — and  glad,  as  well,  that  my  comrades 
cordially  indorse  it,  to  wit :  by  far  the  handsomest  women  we 
have  seen  in  France  were  born  and  reared  in  America. 

I  feel,  now,  like  a  man  who  has  redeemed  a  failing  reputation 
and  shed  luster  upon  a  dimmed  escutcheon,  by  a  single  just 
deed  done  at  the  eleventh  hour. 

Let  the  curtain  fall,  to  slow  music. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

VERSAILLES  !  It  is  wonderfully  beautiful !  You  gaze, 
and  stare,  and  try  to  understand  that  it  is  real,  that 
it  is  on  the  earth,  that  it  is  not  the  Garden  of  Eden — 
but  your  brain  grows  giddy,  stupefied  by  the  world  of  beauty 
around  you,  and  you  half  believe  you  are  the  dupe  of  an  ex 
quisite  dream.  The  scene  thrills  one  like  military  music !  A 
noble  palace,  stretching  its  ornamented  front  block  upon  block 
away,  till  it  seemed  that  it  would  never  end ;  a  grand  promenade 
before  it,  whereon  the  armies  of  an  empire  might  parade;  ail 
about  it  rainbows  of  flowers,  and  colossal  statues  that  were  al 
most  numberless,  and  yet  seemed  only  scattered  over  the  ample 
space;  broad  flights  of  stone  steps  leading  down  from  the 
promenade  to  lower  grounds  of  the  park — stairways  that  whole 
regiments  might  stand  to  arms  upon  and  have  room  to  spare ; 
vast  fountains  whose  great  bronze  effigies  discharged  rivers  of 
sparkling  water  into  the  air  and  mingled  a  hundred  curving 
jets  together  in  forms  of  matchless  beauty ;  wide  grass-carpeted 
avenues' that  branched  hither  and  thither  in  every  direction  and 
wandered  to  seemingly  interminable  distances,  walled  all  the 
way  on  either  side  with  compact  ranks  of  leafy  trees  whose 
branches  met  above  and  formed  arches  as  faultless  and  as 
symmetrical  as  ever  were  carved  in  stone;  and  here  and  there 
were  glimpses  of  sylvan  lakes  with  miniature  ships  glassed  in 
their  surfaces.  And  everywhere — on  the  palace  steps,  and  the 
great  promenade,  around  the  fountains,  among  the  trees,  and 
far  under  the  arches  of  the  endless  avenues,  hundreds  and 
hundreds  of  people  in  gay  costumes  walked  or  ran  or  danced, 
and  gave  to  the  fairy  picture  the  life  and  animation  which  was 
all  of  perfection  it  could  have  lacked. 

It  was  worth  a  pilgrimage  to  see.  Everything  is  on  so  gigantic 
a  scale.  Nothing  is  small — nothing  is  cheap.  The  statues  are 
all  large;  the  palace  is  grand;  the  park  covers  a  fair-sized 
county;  the  avenues  are  interminable.  All  the  distances  and 
all  the  dimensions  about  Versailles  are  vast.  I  used  to  think 
the  pictures  exaggerated  these  distances  and  these  dimensions 
beyond  all  reason,  and  that  they  made  Versailles  more  beautiful 

100 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  103 

than  it  was  possible  for  any  place  in  the  world  to  be.  I  knov,1 
now  that  the  pictures  never  came  up  to  the  subject  in  any  re 
spect,  and  that  no  painter  could  represent  Versailles  on  canvas 
as  beautiful  as  it  is  in  reality.  I  used  to  abuse  Louis  XIV.  for 
spending  two  hundred  millions  of  dollars  in  creating  this  mar 
velous  park,  when  bread  was  so  scarce  with  some  of  his  sub 
jects;  but  I  have  forgiven  him  now.  He  took  a  tract  of  land 
sixty  miles  in  circumference  and  set  to  work  to  make 
this  park  and  build  this  palace  and  a  road  to  it  from  Paris. 
He  kept  36,000  men  employed  daily  on  it,  and  the  labor  was 
so  unhealthy  that  they  used  to  die  and  be  hauled  off  by  cart 
loads  every  night.  The  wife  of  a  nobleman  of  the  time  speaks 
of  this  as  an  "inconvenience"  but  naively  remarks  that  "it  does 
not  seem  worthy  of  attention  in  the  happy  state  of  tranquillity 
we  now  enjoy." 

I  always  thought  ill  of  people  at  home,  who  trimmed  their 
shrubbery  into  pyramids  and  squares  and  spires  and  all  manner 
of  unnatural  shapes,  and  when  I  saw  the  same  thing  being 
practised  in  this  great  park  I  began  to  feel  dissatisfied.  But  I 
soon  saw  the  idea  of  the  thing  and  the  wisdom  of  it.  They  seek 
the  general  effect.  We  distort  a  dozen  sickly  trees  into  un 
accustomed  shapes  in  a  little  yard  no  bigger  than  a  dining- 
room,  and  then  surely  they  look  absurd  enough.  But  here  they 
take  two  hundred  thousand  tall  forest  trees  and  set  them  in  a 
double  row ;  allow  no  sign  of  leaf  or  branch  to  grow  on  the 
trunk  lower  down  than  six  feet  above  the  ground;  from  that 
point  the  boughs  begin  to  project,  and  very  gradually  they  ex 
tend  outward  further  and  further  till  they  meet  overhead,  and 
a  faultless  tunnel  of  foliage  is  formed.  The  arch  is  math 
ematically  precise.  The  effect  is  then  very  fine.  They  make 
trees  take  fifty  different  shapes,  and  so  these  quaint  effects  are 
infinitely  varied  and  picturesque.  The  trees  in  no  two  avenues 
are  shaped  alike,  and  consequently  the  eye  is  not  fatigued  with 
anything  in  the  nature  of  monotonous  uniformity.  I  will  drop 
this  subject  now,  leaving  it  to  others  to  determine  how  these 
people  manage  to  make  endless  ranks  of  lofty  forest  trees  grow 
to  just  a  certain  thickness  of  trunk  (say  a  foot  and  two- 
thirds)  ;  how  they  make  them  spring  to  precisely  the  same 
height  for  miles ;  how  they  make  them  grow  so  close  together ; 
how  they  compel  one  huge  limb  to  spring  from  the  same 
identical  spot  on  each  tree  and  form  the  main  sweep  of  the 
arch;  and  how  all  these  things  are  kept  exactly  in  the  same 


MARK  TWAIN 

condition,  and  in  the  same  exquisite  shapeliness  and  symmetry 
month  after  month  and  year  after  year — for  I  have  tried  to 
reason  out  the  problem,  and  have  failed. 

We  walked  through  the  great  hall  of  sculpture  and  the  one 
hundred  and  fifty  galleries  of  paintings  in  the  palace  of  Ver 
sailles,  and  felt  that  to  be  in  such  a  place  was  useless  unless 
one  had  a  whole  year  at  his  disposal.  These  pictures  are  all 
battle-scenes,  and  only  one  solitary  little  canvas  among  them 
all  treats  of  anything  but  great  French  victories.  We  wan 
dered,  also,  through  the  Grand  Trianon  and  the  Petit  Trianon, 
those  monuments  of  royal  prodigality,  and  with  histories  so 
mournful — filled,  as  it  is,  with  souvenirs  of  Napoleon  the 
First,  and  three  dead  kings  and  as  many  queens.  In  one 
sumptuous  bed  they  had  all  slept  in  succession,  but  no  one 
occupies  it  now.  In  a  large  dining-room  stood  the  table  at 
which  Louis  XIV.  and  his  mistress,  Madame  Maintenon,  and 
after  them  Louis  XV.,  and  Pompadour,  had  sat  at  their  meals 
naked  and  unattended — for  the  table  stood  upon  a  trap-door, 
which  descended  with  it  to  regions  below  when  it  was  neces 
sary  to  replenish  its  dishes.  In  a  room  of  the  Petit  Trianon 
stood  the  furniture,  just  as  poor  Marie  Antoinette  left  it  when 
the  mob  came  and  dragged  her  and  the  King  to  Paris,  never  to 
return.  Near  at  hand,  in  the  stables,  were  prodigious  car 
riages  that  showed  no  color  but  gold — carriages  used  by  former 
kings  of  France  on  state  occasions,  and  never  used  now  save 
when  a  kingly  head  is  to  be  crowned,  or  an  imperial  infant 
christened.  And  with  them  were  some  curious  sleighs,  whose 
bodies  were  shaped  like  lions,  swans,  tigers,  etc. — vehicles  that 
had  once  been  handsome  with  pictured  designs  and  fine  work 
manship,  but  were  dusty  and  decaying  now.  They  had  their 
history.  When  Louis  XIV.  had  finished  the  Grand  Trianon, 
he  told  Maintenon  he  had  created  a  Paradise  for  her,  and  asked 
if  she  could  think  of  anything  now  to  wish  for.  He  said  he 
wished  the  Trianon  to  be  perfection — nothing  less.  She  said 
she  could  think  of  but  one  thing — it  was  summer,  and  it  was 
balmy  France — yet  she  would  like  well  to  sleigh-ride  in  the 
leafy  avenues  of  Versailles!  The  next  morning  found  miles 
and  miles  of  grassy  avenues  spread  thick  with  snowy  salt  and 
sugar,  and  a  procession  of  those  quaint  sleighs  waiting  to  re 
ceive  the  chief  concubine  of  the  gayest  and  most  unprincipled 
court  that  France  has  ever  seen ! 

From  sumptuous  Versailles,  with  its  palaces,  its' statues,  its 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  103 

gardens  and  its  fountains,  we  journeyed  back  to  Paris  and 
sought  its  antipodes — the  Faubourg  St.  Antoin.  Little,  nar 
row  streets;  dirty  children  blockading  them;  greasy,  slovenly 
women  capturing  and  spanking  them ;  filthy  dens  on  first  floors, 
with  rag  stores  in  them  (the  heaviest  business  in  the  Fau 
bourg  is  the  chiffonnier's)  ;  other  filthy  dens  where  whole  suits 
of  second  and  third  hand  clothing  are  sold  at  prices  that  would 
ruin  any  proprietor  who  did  not  steal  his  stock ;  still  other 
filthy  dens  where  they  sold  groceries — sold  them  by  the  half 
pennyworth — five  dollars  would  buy  the  man  out,  good  will  and 
all.  Up  these  little  crooked  streets  they  will  murder  a  man  for 
seven  dollars  and  dump  the  body  in  the  Seine.  And  up  some 
other  of  these  streets — most  of  them,  I  should  say — live  lor- 
ettes. 

All  through  this  Faubourg  St.  Antoine,  misery,  poverty, 
vice,  and  crime  go  hand  in  hand,  and  the  evidence  of  it  stare 
one  in  the  face  from  every  side.  Here  the  people  live  who  be 
gin  the  revolutions.  Whenever  there  is  anything  of  that  kind 
to  be  done,  they  are  always  ready.  They  take  as  much  genuine 
pleasure  in  building  a  barricade  as  they  do  in  cutting  a  throat 
or  shoveling  a  friend  into  the  Seine.  It  is  these  savage-looking 
ruffians  who  storm  the  splendid  halls  of  the  Tuileries,  oc 
casionally,  and  swarm  into  Versailles  when  a  king  is  to  be 
called  to  account. 

But  they  will  build  no  more  barricades,  they  will  break  no 
more  soldiers'  heads  with  paving-stones.  Louis  Napoleon  has 
taken  care  of  all  that.  He  is  annihilating  the  crooked  streets, 
and  building  in  their  stead  noble  boulevards  as  straight  as  an 
arrow —  avenues  which  a  cannon-ball  could  traverse  from  end 
to  end  without  meeting  an  obstruction  more  irresistible  than 
the  flesh  and  bones  of  men — boulevards  whose  stately  edifices 
will  never  afford  refugee  and  plotting-places  for  starving,  dis 
contented  revolution-breeders.  Five  of  these  great  thorough 
fares  radiate  from  one  ample  center — a  center  which  is  ex 
ceedingly  wll  adapted  to  the  accommodation  of  heavy  artillery. 
The  mobs  used  to  riot  there,  but  they  must  seek  another 
rallying-place  in  future.  And  this  ingenious  Napoleon  paves 
the  streets  of  his  great  cities  with  a  smooth,  compact  com 
position  of  asphaltum  and  sand.  No  more  barricades  of  flag 
stones — no  more  assaulting  his  Majesty's  troops  with  cobbles. 
1  cannot  feel  friendly  toward  my  quondam  fellow-American, 


104  MARK  TWAIN 

Napoleon  III.,  especially  at  this  time,1  when  in  fancy  I  see  his 
credulous  victim,  Maximilian,  lying  stark  and  stiff  in  Mexico, 
and  his  maniac  widow  watching  eagerly  from  her  French 
asylum  for  the  form  that  will  never  come — but  I  do  admire 
his  nerve,  his  calm  self-reliance,  his  shrewd  good  sense. 

'July,  1867. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

WE  had  a  pleasant  journey  of  it  seaward  again.  We 
found  that  for  the  three  past  nights  our  ship  had  been 
in  a  state  of  war.  The  first  night  the  sailors  of  a 
British  ship,  being  happy  with  grog,  came  down  on  the  pier 
and  challenged  our  sailors  to  a  free  fight.  They  accepted  with 
alacrity,  repaired  to  the  pier  and  gained — their  share  of  a 
drawn  battle.  Several  bruised  and  bloody  members  of  both 
parties  were  carried  off  by  the  police,  and  imprisoned  until  the 
following  morning.  The  next  night  the  British  boys  came 
again  to  renew  the  fight,  but  our  men  had  had  strict  orders  to 
remain  on  board  and  out  of  sight.  They  did  so,  and  the  besieg 
ing  party  grew  noisy,  and  more  and  more  abusive  as  the  fact 
became  apparent  (to  them)  that  our  men  were  afraid  to  come 
out.  They  went  away,  finally,  with  a  closing  burst  of  ridicule 
and  offensive  epithets.  The  third  night  they  came  again,  and 
were  more  obstreperous  than  ever.  They  swaggered  up  and 
down  the  almost  deserted  pier  and  hurled  curses,  obscenity, 
and  stinging  sarcasms  at  our  crew.  It  was  more  than  human 
nature  could  bear.  The  executive  officer  ordered  our  men 
ashore — with  instructions  not  to  fight.  They  charged  the 
British  and  gained  a  brilliant  victory.  I  probably  would  not 
have  mentioned  this  war  had  it  ended  differently.  But  I  travel 
to  learn,  and  I  still  remember  that  they  picture  no  French  de 
feats  in  the  battle-galleries  of  Versailles. 

It  was  like  home  to  us  to  step  on  board  the  comfortable  ship 
again,  and  smoke  and  lounge  about  her  breezy  decks.  And 
yet  it  was  not  altogether  like  home,  either,  because  so  many 
members  of  the  family  were  away.  We  missed  some  pleasant 
faces  which  we  would  rather  have  found  at  dinner,  and  at  night 
there  were  gaps  in  the  euchre-parties  which  could  not  be 
satisfactorily  rilled.  "Moult"  was  in  England,  Jack  in 
Switzerland,  Charley  in  Spain.  Blucher  was  gone,  none  could 
tell  where.  But  we  were  at  sea  again,  and  we  had  the  stars  and 
the  ocean  to  look  at,  and  plenty  of  room  to  meditate  in. 

In  due  time  the  shores  of  Italy  were  sighted,  and  as  we 
stood  gazing  from  the  decks  early  in  the  bright  summer  morn- 

105 


106  MARK  TWAIN 

ing,  the  stately  city  of  Genoa  rose  up  out  of  the  sea  and  flung 
back  the  sunlight  from  her  hundred  palaces. 

Here  we  rest,  for  the  present — or  rather,  here  we  have  been 
trying  to  rest,  for  some  little  time,  but  we  run  about  too  much  to 
accomplish  a  great  deal  in  that  line. 

I  would  like  to  remain  here.  I  had  rather  not  go  any  fur 
ther.  There  may  be  prettier  women  in  Europe,  but  I  doubt  it. 
The  population  of  Genoa  is  120,000:  two-thirds  of  these  are 
women,  I  think,  and  at  least  two-thirds  of  the  women  are 
beautiful.  They  are  as  dressy  and  as  tasteful  and  as  graceful 
as  they  could  possibly  be  without  being  angels.  However, 
angels  are  not  very  dressy,  I  believe.  At  least  the  angels  in 
pictures  are  not — they  wear  nothing  but  wings.  But  these 
Genoese  women  do  look  so  charming.  Most  of  the  young 
demoiselles  are  robed  in  a  cloud  of  white  from  head  to  foot, 
though  many  trick  themselves  out  more  elaborately.  Nine- 
tenths  of  them  wear  nothing  on  their  heads  but  a  filmy  sort  of 
veil,  which  falls  down  their  backs  like  a  white  mist.  They 
are  very  fair,  and  many  of  them  have  blue  eyes,  but  black  and 
dreamy  dark-brown  ones  are  met  with  oftenest. 

The  ladies  and  gentlemen  of  Genoa  have  a  pleasant  fashion 
of  promenading  in  a  large  park  on  the  top  of  a  hill  in  the  center 
of  the  city,  from  six  till  nine  in  the  evening,  and  then  eating 
ices  in  a  neighboring  garden  an  hour  or  two  longer.  We  went 
to  the  park  on  Sunday  evening.  Two  thousand  persons  were 
present,  chiefly  young  ladies  and  gentlemen.  The  gentlemen 
were  dressed  in  the  very  latest  Paris  fashions,  and  the  robes  of 
the  ladies  glinted  among  the  trees  like  so  many  snow  flakes.  The 
multitude  moved  round  and  round  the  park  in  a  great  procession. 
The  bands  played,  and  so  did  the  fountains ;  the  moon  and  the 
gas-lamps  lit  up  the  scene,  and  altogether  it  was  brilliant  and 
an  animated  picture.  I  scanned  every  female  face  that  passed, 
and  it  seemed  to  me  that  all  were  handsome.  I  never  saw 
such  a  freshet  of  loveliness  before.  I  do  not  see  how  a  man  ot 
only  ordinary  decision  of  character  could  marry  here,  because, 
before  he  could  get  his  mind  made  up  he  would  fall  in  love 
with  somebody  else. 

Never  smoke  any  Italian  tobacco.  Never  do  it  on  any  ac 
count.  It  makes  me  shudder  to  think  what  it  must  be  made  of. 
You  cannot  throw  an  old  cigar  "stub"  down  anywhere,  but 
some  vagabond  will  pounce  upon  it  on  the  instant.  I  like  to 
smoke  a  good  deal,  but  it  wounds  my  sensibilities  to  see  one 
of  these  stub-hunters  watching  me  out  of  the  corners  of  his 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  107 

hungry  eyes  and  calculating  how  long  my  cigar  will  be  likely 
to  last.  It  reminded  me  too  painfully  of  that  San  Francisco 
undertaker  who  used  to  go  to  sick-beds  with  his  watch  in  his 
hand  and  time  the  corpse.  One  of  these  stub-hunters  followed 
us  all  over  the  park  last  night,  and  we  never  had  a  smoke  that 
was  worth  anything.  We  were  always  moved  to  appease  him 
with  the  stub  before  the  cigar  was  half  gone,  because  he  looked 
so  viciously  anxious.  He  regarded  us  as  his  own  legitimate 
prey,  by  right  of  discovery,  I  think,  because  he  drove  off  several 
other  professionals  who  wanted  to  take  stock  in  us. 

Now,  they  surely  must  chew  up  those  old  stubs,  and  dry  and 
sell  them  for  smoking-tobacco.  Therefore,  give  your  custom 
to  other  than  Italian  brands  of  the  article. 

"The  Superb"  and  the  "City  of  Palaces"  are  names  which 
Genoa  had  held  for  centuries.  She  is  full  of  palaces,  cer 
tainly,  and  the  palaces  are  sumptuous  inside,  but  they  are  very 
""rusty  without,  and  make  no  pretensions  to  architectural  mag 
nificence.  "Genoa,  the  Superb,"  would  be  a  felicitous  title  if 
it  referred  to  the  women. 

We  have  visited  several  of  the  palaces — immense  thick- 
walled  piles,  with  great  stone  staircases,  tessellated  marble 
pavements  on  the  floor  (sometimes  they  make  a  mosaic  work, 
of  intricate  designs,  wrought  in  pebbles,  or  little  fragments  of 
marble  laid  in  cement),  and  grand  salons  hung  with  pictures 
by  Rubens,  Guido,  Titian,  Paul  Veronese,  and  so  on,  and  por 
traits  of  heads  of  the  family,  in  plumed  helmets  and  gallant 
coats  of  mail,  and  patrician  ladies,  in  stunning  costumes  of 
centuries  ago.  But,  of  course,  the  folks  were  all  out  in  the 
country  for  the  summer,  and  might  not  have  known  enough  to 
ask  us  to  dinner  if  they  had  been  at  home,  and  so  all  the  grand 
empty  salons,  with  their  resounding  pavements,  their  grim 
pictures  of  dead  ancestors,  and  tattered  banners  with  the  dust 
of  bygone  centuries  upon  them,  seemed  to  brood  solemnly  of 
death  and  the  grave,  and  our  spirits  ebbed  away,  and  our 
cheerfulness  passed  from  us.  We  never  went  up  to  the  ele 
venth  story.  We  always  began  to  suspect  ghosts.  There  was 
always  an  undertaker-looking  servant  along,  too,  who  handed 
us  a  program,  pointed  to  the  picture  that  began  the  list  of  the 
salon  he  was  in,  and  then  stood  stiff  and  stark  and  unsmiling 
in  his  petrified  livery  till  we  were  ready  to  move  on  to  the  next 
chamber,  whereupon  he  marched  sadly  ahead  and  took  up 
another  malignantly  respectful  position  as  before.  I  wasted 
so  much  time  praying  that  the  roof  would  fall  in  on  these 


108  MARK  TWAIN 

dispiriting  flunkeys  that  I  had  but  little  left  to  bestow  upon 
palace  and  pictures. 

And  besides,  as  in  Paris,  we  had  a  guide.  Perdition  catch 
all  the  guides.  This  one  said  he  was  the  most  gifted  linguist 
in  Genoa,  as  far  as  English  was  concerned,  and  that  only  two 
persons  in  the  city  beside  himself  could  talk  the  language  at  all. 
He  showed  us  the  birthplace  of  Christopher  Columbus,  and 
after  we  had  reflected  in  silent  awe  before  it  for  fifteen  min 
utes,  he  said  it  was  not  the  birthplace  of  Columbus,  but  of 
Columbus's  grandmother!  When  we  demanded  an  explana 
tion  of  his  conduct  he  only  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  an 
swered  in  barbarous  Italian.  I  shall  speak  further  of  this 
guide  in  a  future  chapter.  All  the  information  we  got  out  of 
him  we  shall  be  able  to  carry  along  with  us,  I  think. 

I  have  not  been  to  church  so  often  in  a  long  time  as  I  have 
Tin  the  last  few  weeks.  (The  people  in  these  old  lands  seem  to 
make  churches  their  specialty."1  Especially  does  this  seem  to  be 
the  case  with  the  citizens  of  Genoa.  I  think  there  is  a  church 
every  three  or  four  hundred  yards  all  over  town.  The  streets 
are  sprinkled  from  end  to  end  with  shovel-hatted,  long-robed, 
well-fed  priests,  and  the  church  bells  by  dozens  are  pealing 
all  the  day  long,  nearly.  Every  now  and  then  one  comes 
across  a  friar  of  orders  gray,  with  shaven  head,  long,  coarse 
robe,  rope  girdle  and  beads,  and  with  feet  cased  in  sandals 
or  entirely  bare.  These  worthies  suffer  in  the  flesh,  and  do 
penance  all  their  lives,  I  suppose,  but  they  look  like  consum 
mate  famine-breeders.  They  are  all  fat  and  serene. 

The  old  Cathedral  of  San  Lorenzo  is  about  as  notable  a 
building  as  we  have  found  in  Genoa.  It  is  vast,  and  has 
colonnades  of  noble  pillars,  and  a  great  organ,  and  the  cus 
tomary  pomp  of  gilded  moldings,  pictures,  frescoed  ceilings,  - 
and  so  forth.  I  cannot  describe  it,  of  course — it  would  re 
quire  a  good  many  pages  to  do  that.  But  it  is  a  curious  place. 
They  said  that  half  of  it — from  the  front  door  half-way  down 
to  the  altar — was  a  Jewish  Synagogue  before  the  Saviour  was 
born,  and  that  no  alteration  had  been  made  in  it  since  that 
time.  \Ve  doubted  the  statement,  but  did  it  reluctantly.  We 
would  much  rather  have  believed  it.  The  place  looked  in  too 
perfect  repair  to  be  so  ancient. 

The  main  point  of  interest  about  the  cathedral  is  the  little 
Chapel  of  St.  John  the  Baptist.  They  only  allow  women  to 
enter  it  on  one  day  in  the  year,  on  account  of  the  animosity 
they  still  cherish  against  the  sex  because  of  the  murder  of  the 


* 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  109 


Saint  to  gratify  a  caprice  of  Herodias.  In  this  chapel  is  a 
marble  chest,  in  which,  they  told  us,  were  the  ashes  of  St. 
John;  and  around  it  was  wound  a  chain,  which,  they  said,  had 
confined  him  when  he  was  in  prison.  We  did  not  desire  to 
disbelieve  these  statements,  and  yet  we  could  not  feel  certain 
that  they  were  correct  —  partly  because  we  could  have  broken 
that  chain,  and  so  could  St.  John,  and  partly  because  we  had 
seen  St.  John's  ashes  before,  in  another  church.  We  could 
not  bring  ourselves  to  think  St.  John  had  two  sets  of  ashes. 

They  also  showed  us  a  portrait  of  the  Madonna  which  was 
painted  by  St.  Luke,  and  it  did  not  look  half  as  old  and  smoky 
as  some  of  the  pictures  by  Rubens.  We  could  not  help  admir 
ing  the  Apostle's  modesty  in  never  once  mentioning  in  his 
writings  that  he  could  paint. 

But  isn't  this  relic  matter  a  little  overdone  ?  We  find  a  piece 
of  the  true  cross  in  every  old  church  we  go  into,  and  some  of 
the  nails  that  held  it  together.  I  would  not  like  to  be  positive, 
but  I  think  we  have  seen  as  much  as  a  keg  of  these  nails.  Then 
there  is  the  crown  of  thorns;  they  have  part  of  one  in  Sainte 
Chapelle,  in  Paris,  and  part  of  one,  also,  in  Notre  Dame.  And 
as  for  bones  of  St.  Denis,  I.  feel  certain  we  have  seen  enough 
of  them  to  duplicate  him,  if  necessary. 

I  only  meant  to  write  about  the  churches,  but  I  keep  wander 
ing  from  the  subject.  I  could  say  that  the  Church  of  the 
Annunciation  is  a  wilderness  of  beautiful  columns,  of  statues, 
gilded  moldings,  and  pictures  almost  countless,  but  that  would 
give  no  one  an  entirely  perfect  idea  of  the  thing,  and  so  where 
is  the  use?  One  family  built  the  whole  edifice,  and  have  got 
money  left.  There  is  where  the  mystery  lies.  We  had  an 
idea  at  first  that  only  a  mint  could  have  survived  the  expense. 

These  people  here  live  in  the  heaviest,  highest,  broadest, 
darkest,  solidest  houses  o.ne  can  imagine.  Each  one  might 
'laugh  a  siege  to  scorn."  A  hundred  feet  front  and  a  hundred 
high  is  about  the  style,  asd  you  go  up  three  flights  of  stairs 
before  you  begin  to  come  upon  signs  of  occupancy.  Every 
thing  is  stone,  and  stone  of  the  heaviest  —  floors,  stairways,  man 
tels,  benches  —  everything.  The  walls  are  four  or  five  feet 
thick.  The  streets  generally  are  four  or  five  to  eight  feet 
wide  and  as  crooked  as  a  corkscrew.  You  go  along  one  of 
these  gloomy  cracks,  and  look  up  and  behold  the  sky  like  a  mere 
ribbon  of  light,  far  above  your  head,  where  the  tops  of  the  tall 
houses  on  either  side  of  the  street  bend  almost  together.  You 
feel  as  if  you  were  at  the  bottom  of  some  tremendous  abyss, 


110  MARK  TWAIN 

with  all  the  world  far  above  you.  You  wind  in  and  out  and 
here  and  there,  in  the  most  mysterious  way,  and  have  no  more 
idea  of  the  points  of  the  compass  than  if  you  were  a  blind  man. 
You  can  never  persuade  yourself  that  these  are  actually  streets, 
and  the  frowning,  dingy,  monstrous  houses  dwellings,  till  you 
see  one  of  these  beautiful,  prettily  dressed  women  emerge  from 
them — see  her  emerge  from  a  dark,  dreary-looking  den  that 
looks  dungeon  all  over,  from  the  ground  away  half-way  up  to 
heaven.  And  then  you  wonder  that  such  a  charming  moth 
could  come  from  such  a  forbidding  shell  as  that.  The  streets 
are  wisely  made  narrow  and  the  houses  heavy  and  thick  and 
stony,  in  order  that  the  people  may  be  cool  in  this  roasting 
climate.  And  they  are  cool,  and  stay  so.  And  while  I  think 
of  it — the  men  wear  hats  and  have  very  dark  complexions,  but 
the  women  wear  no  headgear  but  a  flimsy  veil  like  a  gossamer's 
web,  and  yet  are  exceedingly  fair  as  a  general  thing.  Singular, 
isn't  it? 

The  huge  palaces  of  Genoa  are  each  supposed  to  be  occupied 
by  one  family,  but  they  could  accomodate  a  hundred,  I  should 
think.  They  are  relics  of  the  grandeur  of  Genoa's  palmy  days — 
the  days  when  she  was  a  great  commercial  and  maritime  power 
several  centuries  ago.  These  houses,  solid  marble  palaces 
though  they  be,  are,  in  many  cases,  of  a  dull  pinkish  color,  out 
side,  and  from  pavement  to  eaves  are  pictured  with  Genoese 
battle-scenes,  with  monstrous  Jupiters  and  Cupids  and  with 
familiar  illustrations  from  Grecian  mythology.  Where  the 
paint  has  yielded  to  age  and  exposure  and  is  peeling  off  in 
flakes  and  patches,  the  effect  is  not  happy.  A  noseless  Cupid, 
or  a  Jupiter  with  an  eye  out,  or  a  Venus  with  a  fly-blister  on 
her  breast,  are  not  attractive  features  in  a  picture.  Some  of 
these  painted  walls  reminded  me  somewhat  of  the  tali  van, 
plastered  with  fanciful  bills  and  posters,  that  follows  the  band 
wagon  of  a  circus  about  a  country  village.  I  have  not  read  or 
heard  that  the  outsides  of  the  houses  of  any  other  European 
city  are  frescoed  in  this  way. 

I  cannot  conceive  of  such  a  thing  as  Genoa  in  ruins.  Such 
massive  arches,  such  ponderous  substructions  as  support  these 
towering  broad-winged  edifices,  we  have  seldom  seen  before; 
and  surely  the  great  blocks  of  stone  of  which  these  edifices  are 
built  can  never  decay;  walls  that  are  as  thick  as  an  ordinary 
American  doorway  is  high,  cannot  crumble. 

The  Republics  of  Genoa  and  Pisa  were  very  powerful  in  the 
Middle  Ages.  Their  ships  filled  the  Mediterranean,  and  they 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  111 

carried  on  an  extensive  commerce  with  Constantinople  and 
Syria.  Their  warehouses  were  the  great  distributing  depots 
from  whence  the  costly  merchandise  of  the  East  was  sent 
abroad  over  Europe.  They  were  warlike  little  nations,  and 
defied,  in  those  days,  governments  that  overshadow  them  now 
as  mountains  overshadow  molehills.  The  Saracens  captured 
and  pillaged  Genoa  nine  hundred  years  ago,  but  during  the 
following  century  Genoa  and  Pisa  entered  into  an  offensive 
and  defensive  alliance  and  besieged  the  Saracen  colonies  in 
Sardina  and  the  Balearic  Isles  with  an  obstinancy  that  main 
tained  its  pristine  vigor  and  held  to  its  purpose  for  forty  long 
years.  They  were  victorious  at  last,  and  divided  their  con 
quests  equably  among  their  great  patrician  families.  Descen 
dants  of  some  of  those  proud  families  still  inhabit  the  palaces 
of  Genoa,  and  trace  in  their  own  features  a  resemblance  to  the 
grim  knights  whose  portraits  hang  in  their  stately  halls,  and 
to  pictured  beauties  with  pouting  lips  and  merry  eyes  whose 
originals  have  been  dust  and  ashes  for  many  a  dead  and  for 
gotten  century. 

The  hotel  we  live  in  belonged  to  one  of  those  great  orders 
of  Knights  of  the  Cross  in  the  times  of  the  Crusades,  and  its 
mailed  sentinels  once  kept  watch  and  ward  in  its  massive  tur 
rets  and  woke  the  echoes  of  these  halls  and  corridors  with  their 
iron  heels. 

But  Genoa's  greatness  has  degenerated  into  an  unostenta 
tious  commerce  in  velvets  and  silver  filigree  work.  They  say 
that  each  European  town  has  its  specialty.  These  filigree  things 
are  Genoa's  specialty.  Her  smiths  take  silver  ingots  and  work 
them  up  into  all  manner  of  graceful  and  beautiful  forms.  They 
make  bunches  of  flowers,  from  flakes  and  wires  of  silver,  that 
counterfeit  the  delicate  creations  the  frost  weaves  upon  a  win 
dow-pane  ;  and  we  were  shown  a  miniature  silver  temple  whose 
fluted  columns,  whose  Corinthian  capitals  and  rich  entablatures, 
whose  spire,  statues,  bells,  and  ornate  lavishness  of  sculpture 
were  wrought  in  polished  silver,  and  with  such  matchless  art 
that  every  detail  was  a  fascinating  study,  and  the  finished  edi 
fice  a  wonder  of  beauty. 

We  are  ready  to  move  again,  though  we  are  not  really  tired, 
yet,  of  the  narrow  passages  of  this  old  marble  cave.  Cave  is 
a  good  word — when  speaking  of  Genoa  under  the  stars.  When 
we  have  been  prowling  at  midnight  through  the  gloomy  crevices 
they  call  streets,  where  no  footfalls  but  ours  were  echoing, 
where  only  ourselves  were  abroad,  and  lights  appeared  only  at 


112  MARK  TWAIN 

long  intervals  and  at  a  distance,  and  mysteriously  disappeared 
again,  and  the  houses  at  our  elbows  seemed  to  stretch  upward 
farther  than  ever  toward  the  heavens,  the  memory  of  a  cave 
I  used  to  know  at  home  was  always  in  my  mind,  with  its  lofty 
passages,  its  silence  and  solitude,  its  shrouding  gloom,  its  se 
pulchral  echoes,  its  fitting  lights,  and  more  than  all,  its  sudden 
revelations  of  branching  crevices  and  corridors  where  we  least 
expected  them. 

We  are  not  tired  of  the  endless  processions  of  cheerful,  chat 
tering  gossipers  that  throng  these  courts  and  streets  all  day 
long,  either ;  nor  of  the  coarse-robed  monks ;  nor  of  the  "Asti" 
wines,  which  that  old  doctor  (whom  we  call  the  Oracle)  with 
customary  felicity  in  the  matter  of  getting  everything  wrong, 
misterms  "nasty."  But  we  must  go,  nevertheless. 

Our  last  sight  was  the  cemetery  (a  burial-place  intended  to 
accommodate  60,000  bodies), and  we  shall  continue  to  remember 
it  after  we  shall  have  forgotten  the  palaces.  It  is  a  vast  marble 
colonnaded  corridor  extending  around  a  great  unoccupied 
square  of  ground;  its  broad  floor  is  marble,  and  on  every  slab 
is  an  inscription — for  every  slab  covers  a  corpse.  On  either 
side,  as  one  walks  down  the  middle  of  the  passage,  are  monu 
ments,  tombs,  and  sculptured  figures  that  are  exquisitely 
wrought  and  are  full  of  grace  and  beauty.  They  are  new  and 
snowy ;  every  outline  is  perfect,  every  feature  guiltless  of  muti 
lation,  flaw,  or  blemish ;  and,  therefore,  to  us  these  far-reaching 
ranks  of  bewitching  forms  are  a  hundredfold  more  lovely  than 
the  damaged  and  dingy  statuary  they  have  saved  from  the  wreck 
of  ancient  art  and  set  up  in  the  galleries  of  Paris  for  the  wor 
ship  of  the  world. 

Well  provided  with  cigars  and  other  necessaries  of  life,  we 
are  now  ready  to  take  the  cars  for  Milan. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

ALL  day  long  we  sped  through  a  mountainous  country 
whose  peaks  were  bright  with  sunshine,  whose  hill 
sides  were  dotted  with  pretty  villas  sitting  in  the  midst  of 
gardens  and  shrubbery,  and  whose  deep  ravines  were  cool  and 
shady,  and  looked  ever  so  inviting  from  where  we  and  the  birds 
were  winging  our  flight  through  the  sultry  upper  air. 

We  had  plenty  of  chilly  tunnels  wherein  to  check  our  per 
spiration,  though.  We  timed  one  of  them.  We  were  twenty 
minutes  passing  through  it,  going  at  the  rate  of  thirty  to  thirty- 
five  miles  an  hour. 

Beyond  Alessandria  we  passed  the  battle-field  of  Marengo. 

Toward  dusk  we  drew  near  Milan,  and  caught  glimpses  of 
the  city  and  the  blue  mountain-peaks  beyond.  But  we  were  not 
caring  for  these  things — they  did  not  interest  us  in  the  least. 
We  were  in  a  fever  of  impatience;  we  were  dying  to  see  the 
renowned  cathedral !  We  watched — in  this  direction  and  that — 
all  around — everywhere.  We  needed  no  one  to  point  it  out — 
we  did  not  wish  any  one  to  point  it  out — we  would  recognize  it, 
even  in  the  desert  of  the  great  Sahara. 

At  last,  a  forest  of  graceful  needles,  shimmering  in  the  amber 
sunlight,  rose  slowly  above  the  pygmy  housetops,  as  one  some 
times  sees,  in  the  far  horizon,  a  gilded  and  pinnacled  mass  of 
cloud  lift  itself  above  the  waste  of  waves,  at  sea, — the  cathed 
ral  !  We  knew  it  in  a  moment. 

Half  of  that  night,  and  all  of  the  next  day,  this  architec 
tural  autocrat  was  our  sole  object  of  interest. 

What  a  wonder  it  is !  So  grand,  so  solemn,  so  vast !  And 
yet  so  delicate,  so  airy,  so  graceful!  A  very  world  of  solid 
weight,  and  yet  it  seems  in  the  soft  moonlight  only  a  fairy 
delusion  of  frostwork  that  might  vanish  with  a  breath!  How 
sharply  its  pinnacled  angles  and  its  wilderness  of  spires  were 
cut  against  the  sky,  and  how  richly  their  shadows  fell  upon 
its  snowy  roof  !  It  was  a  vision ! — a  miracle ! — an  anthem  sung 
in  stone,  a  poem  wrought  in  marble! 

Howsoever  you  look  at  the  great  cathedral,  it  is  noble,  it  is 
beautiful !  \Vherever  you  stand  in  Milan,  or  within  seven  miles 

113 


114  MARK  TWAIN 

of  Milan,  it  is  visible — and  when  it  is  visible,  no  other  object 
can  chain  your  whole  attention.  Leave  your  eyes  unfettered 
by  your  will  but  a  single  instant  and  they  will  surely  turn  to 
seek  it.  It  is  the  first  thing  you  look  for  when  you  rise  in 
the  morning,  and  the  last  your  lingering  gaze  rests  upon  at 
night.  Surely,  it  must  be  the  princeliest  creation  that  ever 
brain  of  man  conceived. 

At  nine  o'clock  in  the  morning  we  went  and  stood  before  this 
marble  colossus.  The  central  one  of  its  five  great  doors  is 
bordered  with  a  bas-relief  of  birds  and  fruits  and  beasts  and 
insects,  which  have  been  so  ingeniously  carved  out  of  the  marble 
that  they  seem  like  living  creatures — and  the  figures  are  so 
numerous  and  the  design  so  complex,  that  one  might  study  it 
a  week  without  exhausting  its  interest.  On  the  great  steeple — 
surmounting  the  myriad  of  spires— inside  of  the  spires — over 
the  doors,  the  windows — in  nooks  and  corners — everywhere 
that  a  niche  or  a  perch  can  be  found  about  the  enormous  build 
ing,  from  summit  to  base,  there  is  a  marble  statue,  and  every 
statue  is  a  study  in  itself !  Raphael,  Angelo,  Canova — giants 
like  these  gave  birth  to  the  designs,  and  their  own  pupils  carved 
them.  Every  face  is  eloquent  with  expression,  and  every  at 
titude  is  full  of  grace.  Away  above,  on  the  lofty  roof,  rank  on 
rank  of  carved  and  fretted  spires  spring  high  in  the  air,  and 
through  their  rich  tracery  one  sees  the  sky  beyond.  In  their 
midst  the  central  steeple  towers  proudly  up  like  the  mainmast 
of  some  great  Indiaman  among  a  fleet  of  coasters. 

We  wished  to  go  aloft.  The  sacristan  showed  us  a  marble 
stairway  (of  course  it  was  marble,  and  of  the  purest  and  whit 
est — there  is  no  other  stone,  no  brick,  no  wood,  among  its 
building-materials),  and  told  us  to  go  up  one  hundred  and 
eighty-two  steps  and  stop  till  he  came.  It  was  not  necessary 
to  say  stop — we  should  have  done  that  anyhow.  We  were  tired 
by  the  time  we  got  here.  This  was  the  roof.  Here,  springing 
from  its  broad  marble  flagstones,  were  the  long  files  of  spires, 
looking  very  tall  close  at  hand,  but  diminishing  in  the  distance 
like  the  pipes  of  an  organ.  We  could  see,  now,  that  the  statue 
on  the  top  of  each  was  the  size  of  a  large  man,  though  they  all 
looked  like  dolls  from  the  street.  We  could  see,  also,  that 
from  the  inside  of  each  and  every  one  of  these  hollow  spires, 
from  sixteen  to  thirty-one  beautiful  marble  statues  looked  out 
upon  the  world  below. 

From  the  eaves  to  the  comb  of  the  roof  stretched  in  endless 
succession  great  curved  marble  beams,  like  the  fore-and-aft 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  115 

braces  of  a  steamboat,  and  along  each  beam  from  end  to  end 
stood  up  a  row  of  richly  carved  flowers  and  fruits — each  sep 
arate  and  distinct  in  kind,  and  over  15,000  species  represented. 
At  a  little  distance  these  rows  seem  close  together  like  the 
ties  of  a  railroad  track,  and  then  the  mingling  together  of  the 
buds  and  blossoms  of  this  marble  garden  forms  a  picture  that 
is  very  charming  to  the  eye. 

We  descended  and  entered.  Within  the  church,  long  rows 
of  fluted  columns,  like  huge  monuments,  divided  the  building 
into  broad  aisles,  and  on  the  figured  pavement  fell  many  a 
soft  blush  from  the  painted  windows  above.  I  knew  the  church 
was  very  large,  but  I  could  not  fully  appreciate  its  great  size 
until  I  noticed  that  the  men  standing  far  down  by  the  altar 
looked  like  boys,  and  seemed  to  glide,  rather  than  walk.  We 
loitered  about  gazing  aloft  at  the  monster  windows  all  aglow 
with  brilliantly  colored  scenes  in  the  lives  of  the  Saviour  and 
His  followers.  Some  of  these  pictures  are  mosaic,  and  so 
artistically  are  their  thousand  particles  of  tinted  glass  or  stone 
put  together  that  the  work  has  all  the  smoothness  and  finish 
of  a  painting.  We  counted  sixty  panes  of  glass  in  one  window, 
and  each  pane  was  adorned  with  one  of  these  master  achieve 
ments  of  genius  and  patience. 

The  guide  showed  us  a  coffee-colored  piece  of  sculpture 
which  he  said  was  considered  to  have  come  from  the  hand  of 
Phidias,  since  it  was  not  possible  that  any  other  artist,  of  any 
epoch,  could  have  copied  nature  with  such  faultless  accuracy. 
The  figure  was  that  of  a  man  without  a  skin;  with  every  vein, 
artery,  muscle,  every  fiber  and  tendon  and  tissue  of  the  human 
frame,  represented  in  minute  detail.  It  looked  natural,  be 
cause  somehow  it  looked  as  if  it  were  in  pain.  A  skinned  man 
would  be  likely  to  look  that  way,  unless  his  attention  were  oc 
cupied  with  some  other  matter.  It  was  a  hideous  thing,  and 
yet  there  was  a  fascination  about  it  somewhere.  I  am  very 
sorry  I  saw  it,  because  I  shall  always  see  it,  now.  I  shall 
dream  of  it,  sometimes.  I  shall  dream  that  it  is  resting  its 
corded  arms  on  the  bed's  head  and  looking  down  on  me  with 
its  dead  eyes;  I  shall  dream  that  it  is  stretched  between  the 
sheets  with  me  and  touching  me  with  its  exposed  muscles  and 
its  stringy  cold  legs. 

It  is  hard  to  forget  repulsive  things.  I  remember  yet  how 
I  ran  off  from  school  once,  when  I  was  a  boy,  and  then,  pretty 
late  at  night,  concluded  to  climb  into  the  window  of  my  father's 
office  and  sleep  on  a  lounge,  because  I  had  delicacy  about  go- 


116  MARK  TWAIN 

ing  home  and  getting  thrashed.  As  I  lay  on  the  lounge  and  my 
eyes  grew  accustomed  to  the  darkness,  I  fancied  1  could  see 
a  long,  dusky,  shapeless  thing  stretched  upon  the  floor.  A  cold 
shiver  went  through  me.  I  turnd  my  face  to  the  wall.  That 
did  not  answer.  1  was  afraid  that  that  thing  would  creep  over 
and  seize  me  in  the  dark.  I  turned  back  and  stared  at  it  for 
minutes  and  minutes — they  seemed  hours.  It  appeared  to  me 
that  the  lagging  moonlight  never  never  would  get  to  it.  I 
turned  to  the  wall  and  counted  twenty,  to  pass  the  feverish  time 
away.  I  looked — the  pale  square  was  nearer.  I  turned  again 
and  counted  fifty — it  was  almost  touching  it.  With  desperate 
will  I  turned  again  and  counted  one  hundred,  and  faced  about, 
all  in  a  tremble.  A  white  human  hand  lay  in  the  moonlight! 
Such  an  awful  sinking  at  the  heart — such  a  sudden  gasp  tor 
breath!  I  felt — I  cannot  tell  what  I  felt.  When  I  recovered 
strength  enough,  I  faced  the  wall  again.  But  no  boy  could  have 
remained  so,  with  that  mysterious  hand  behind  him.  I  counted 
again,  and  looked — the  most  of  a  naked  arm  was  exposed.  I 
put  my  hands  over  my  eyes  and  counted  till  I  could  stand  it  no 
longer,  and  then — the  pallid  face  of  a  man  was  there,  with  the 
corners  of  the  mouth  drawn  down,  and  the  eyes  fixed  and 
glassy  in  death !  I  raised  to  a  sitting  posture  and  glowered  on 
that  corpse  till  the  light  crept  down  the  bare  breast, — line  by 
line — inch  by  inch — past  the  nipple, — and  then  it  disclosed  a 
ghastly  stab! 

I  went  away  from  there.  I  do  not  say  that  I  went  away  in 
any  sort  of  hurry,  but  I  simply  went — that  is  sufficient.  1 
went  out  at  the  window,  and  I  carried  the  sash  along  with  me. 
I  did  not  need  the  sash,  but  it  was  handier  to  take  it  than  it 
was  to  leave  it,  and  so  I  took  it.  I  was  not  scared,  but  I  was 
considerably  agitated. 

When  I  reached  home,  they  whipped  me,  but  I  enjoyed  it. 
It  seemed  perfectly  delightful.  That  man  had  been  stabbed 
near  the  office  that  afternoon,  and  they  carried  him  in  there 
to  doctor  him,  but  he  only  lived  an  hour.  I  have  slept  in  the 
same  room  with  him  often,  since  then — in  my  dreams. 

Now  we  will  descend  into  the  crypt,  under  the  grand  altar 
of  Milan  cathedral,  and  receive  an  impressive  sermon  from  the 
lips  that  have  been  silent  and  hands  that  have  been  gestureless 
for  three  hundred  years. 

The  priest  stopped  in  a  small  dungeon  and  held  up  his 
candle.  This  was  the  last  resting-place  of  a  good  man,  a  warm 
hearted,  unselfish  man;  a  man  whose  whole  life  was  given  to 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  117 

succoring  the  poor,  encouraging  the  faint-hearted,  visiting  the 
sick;  in  relieving  distress,  whenever  and  wherever  he  found  it. 
His  heart,  his  hand,  and  his  purse  were  always  open.  With 
his  story  in  one's  mind  he  can  almost  see  his  benignant  counte 
nance  moving  calmly  among  the  haggard  faces  of  Milan  in  the 
days  when  the  plague  swept  the  city,  brave  where  all  others 
were  cowards,  full  of  compassion  where  pity  had  been  crushed 
out  of  all  other  breasts  by  the  instinct  of  self-preservation  gone 
mad  with  terror,  cheering  all,  praying  with  all,  helping  all,  with 
hand  and  brain  and  purse,  at  a  time  when  parents  forsook  their 
children,  the  friend  deserted  the  friend,  and  the  brother  turned 
away  from  the  sister  while  her  pleadings  were  still  wailing  in 
his  ears. 

This  was  good  St.  Charles  Borromeo,  Bishop  of  Milan.  The 
people  idolized  him ;  princes  lavished  uncounted  treasures  upon 
him.  We  stood  in  his  tomb.  Near  by  was  the  sarcophagus, 
lighted  by  the  dripping  candles.  The  walls  were  faced  with 
bas-reliefs  representing  scenes  in  his  life  done  in  massive  silver. 
The  priest  put  on  a  short  white  lace  garment  over  his  black  robe, 
crossed  himself,  bowed  reverently,  and  began  to  turn  a  wind 
lass  slowly.  The  sarcophagus  separated  in  two  parts,  length 
wise,  and  the  lower  part  sank  down  and  disclosed  a  coffin  of 
rock  crystal  as  clear  as  the  atmosphere.  Within  lay  the  body, 
robed  in  costly  habiliments  covered  with  gold  embroidery  and 
starred  with  scintillating  gems.  The  decaying  head  was  black 
with  age,  the  dry  skin  was  drawn  tight  to  the  bones,  the  eyes 
were  gone,  there  was  a  hole  in  the  temple  and  another  in  the 
cheek,  and  the  skinny  lips  were  parted  as  in  a  ghastly  smile ! 
Over  this  dreadful  face,  its  dust  and  decay,  and  its  mocking 
grin,  hung  a  crown  sown  thick  with  flashing  brilliants;  and 
upon  the  breast  lay  crosses  and  croziers  of  solid  gold  that  were 
splendid  with  emeralds  and  diamonds. 

How  poor,  and  cheap,  and  trivial  these  gewgaws  seemed  in 
presence  of  the  solemnity,  the  grandeur,  the  awful  majesty  of 
Death!  Think  of  Milton,  Shakespeare,  Washington,  standing 
before  a  reverent  world  tricked  out  in  the  glass  beads,  the 
brass  earrings,  and  tin  trumpery  of  the  savages  of  the  plains ! 

Dead  Borromeo  preached  his  pregnant  sermon,  and  its  bur 
den  was:  You  that  worship  the  vanities  of  earth — you  that 
long  for  worldly  honor,  worldly  wealth,  worldly  fame — behold 
their  worth ! 

To  us  it  seemed  that  so  good  a  man,  so  kind  a  heart,  so 
simple  a  nature,  deserved  rest  and  peace  in  a  grave  sacred  from 


118  MARK  TWAIN 

the  intrusion  of  prying  eyes,  and  believed  that  he  himself  vwould 
have  preferred  to  have  it  so,  but  peradventure  our  wisdom  was 
at  fault  in  this  regard. 

As  we  came  out  upon  the  floor  of  the  church  again,  another 
priest  volunteered  to  show  us  the  treasures  of  the  church. 
What,  more?  The  furniture  of  the  narrow  chamber  of  death 
we  had  just  visited,  weighed  six  millions  of  francs  in  ounces 
and  carats  alone,  without  a  penny  thrown  into  the  account  for 
the  costly  workmanship  bestowed  upon  them !  But  we  fol 
lowed  into  a  large  room  filled  with  tall  wooden  presses  like 
wardrobes.  He  threw  them  open,  and  behold,  the  cargoes  of 
"crude  bullion"  of  the  assay-offices  of  Nevada  faded  out  of  my 
memory.  There  were  Virgins  and  bishops  there,  above  their 
natural  size,  made  of  solid  silver,  each  worth,  by  weight,  from 
eight  hundred  thousand  to  two  millions  of  francs,  and  bearing 
gemmed  books  in  their  hands  worth  eighty  thousand;  there 
were  bas-reliefs  that  weighed  six  hundred  pounds,  carved  in 
solid  silver ;  croziers  and  crosses,  and  candlesticks  six  and  eight 
feet  high,  all  of  virgin  gold,  and  brilliant  with  precious  stones ; 
and  beside  these  were  all  manner  of  cups  and  vases,  and  such 
things,  rich  in  proportion.  It  was  an  Aladdin's  palace.  The 
treasures  here,  by  simple  weight,  without  counting  workman 
ship,  were  valued  at  fifty  millions  of  francs!  If  I  could  get 
the  custody  of  them  for  a  while,  I  fear  me  the  market  price  of 
silver  bishops  would  advance  shortly,  on  account  of  their  ex 
ceeding  scarcity  in  the  Cathedral  of  Milan. 

The  priests  showed  us  two  of  St.  Paul's  fingers,  and  one  of 
St.  Peter's;  a  bone  of  Judas  Iscariot  (it  was  black),  and  also 
bones  of  all  the  other  disciples;  a  handkerchief  in  which  the 
Saviour  had  left  the  impression  of  his  face.  Among  the  most 
precious  of  relics  were,  a  stone  from  the  Holy  Sepulcher,  part 
of  the  crown  of  thorns  (they  have  a  whole  one  at  Notre  Dame), 
a  fragment  of  the  purple  robe  worn  by  the  Saviour,  a  nail  from 
the  Cross,  and  a  picture  of  the  Virgin  and  Child  painted  by  the 
veritable  hand  of  St.  Luke.  This  is  the  second  of  St.  Luke's 
Virgin's  we  have  seen.  Once  a  year  all  these  holy  relics  are 
carried  in  procession  through  the  streets  of  Milan. 

I  like  to  revel  in  the  dryest  details  of  the  great  cathedral. 
The  building  is  five  hundred  feet  long  by  one  hundred  and 
eighty  wide,  and  the  principal  steeple  is  in  the  neighborhood 
of  four  hundred  feet  high.  It  has  7,148  marble  statues,  and 
will  have  upward  of  three  thousand  more  when  it  is  finished. 
In  addition,  it  has  one  thousand  five  hundred  bas-reliefs.  It 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  119 

has  one  hundred  and  thirty-six  spires — twenty-one  more  are 
to  be  added.  Each  spire  is  surmounted  by  a  statue  six  and  a 
half  feet  high.  Everything  about  the  church  is  marble,  and  all 
from  the  same  quarry;  it  was  bequeathed  to  the  Archbishopric 
for  this  purpose  centuries  ago.  So  nothing  but  the  mere 
workmanship  costs;  still  that  is  expensive — the  bill  foots  up 
six  hundred  and  eighty-four  millions  of  francs,  thus  far  (con 
siderably  over  a  hundred  millions  of  dollars),  and  it  is  estimated 
that  it  will  take  a  hundred  and  twenty  years  yet  to  finish  the 
cathedral.  It  looks  complete,  but  is  far  from  being  so.  We 
saw  a  new  statue  put  in  its  niche  yesterday,  alongside  of  one 
which  had  been  standing  these  four  hundred  years,  they  said. 
There  are  four  staircases  leading  up  to  the  main  steeple,  each 
of  which  cost  a  hundred  thousand  dollars,  with  the  four  hun 
dred  and  eight  statues  which  adorn  them.  Marcoda  Campione 
was  the  architect  who  designed  the  wonderful  structure  more 
than  five  hundred  years  ago,  and  it  took  him  forty-six  years 
to  work  out  the  plan  and  get  it  ready  to  hand  over  to  the 
builders.  He  is  dead  now.  The  building  was  begun  a  little 
less  than  five  hundred  years  ago,  and  the  third  generation  hence 
will  not  see  it  completed. 

The  building  looks  best  by  moonlight,  because  the  older 
portions  of  it  being  stained  with  age,  contrast  unpleasantly 
with  the  newer  and  whiter  portions.  It  seems  somewhat  too 
broad  for  its  height,  but  maybe  familiarity  with  it  might  dis 
sipate  this  impression. 

They  say  that  the  Cathedral  of  Milan  is  second  only  to  St. 
Peter's  at  Rome.  I  cannot  understand  how  it  can  be  second  to 
anything  made  by  human  hands. 

We  bid  it  good-by  now — possibly  for  all  time.  How  surely, 
in  some  future  day,  when  the  memory  of  it  shall  have  lost  its 
vividness,  shall  we  half  believe  we  have  seen  it  in  a  wonderful 
dream,  but  never  with  waking  eyes! 


CHAPTER  XIX 

DO  you  wis  zo  haut  can  be?" 
That  was  what  the  guide  asked,  when  we  were  look 
ing  up  at  the  bronze  horses  on  the  Arch  of  Peace.  It 
meant,  Do  you  wish  to  go  up  there?  I  give  it  as  a  specimen 
of  guide-English.  These  are  the  people  that  make  life  a  bur 
then  to  the  tourist.  Their  tongues  are  never  still.  They  talk 
forever  and  forever,  and  that  is  the  kind  of  billingsgate  they 
use.  Inspiration  itself  could  hardly  comprehend  them.  If 
they  would  only  show  you  a  masterpiece  of  art,  or  a  venerable 
tomb,  or  a  prison-house,  or  a  battle-field,  hallowed  by  touching 
memories,  or  historical  reminiscences,  or  grand  traditions,  and 
then  step  aside  and  hold  still  for  ten  minutes  and  let  you  think, 
it  would  not  be  so  bad.  But  they  interrupt  every  dream,  every 
pleasant  train  of  thought,  with  their  tiresome  cackling.  Some 
times  when  I  have  been  standing  before  some  cherished  old 
idol  of  mine  that  I  remembered  years  and  years  ago  in  pictures 
in  the  geography  at  school,  I  have  thought  I  would  give  a  whole 
world  if  the  human  parrot  at  my  side  would  suddenly  perish 
where  he  stood  arid  leave  me  to  gaze,  and  ponder,  and  worship. 

No,  we  did  not  "wis  zo  haut  can  be."  We  wished  to  go  to 
La  Scala,  the  largest  theater  in  the  world,  I  think  they  call  it. 
We  did  so.  It  was  a  large  place.  Seven  separate  and  distinct 
masses  of  humanity — six  great  circles  and  a  monster  parquette. 

We  wished  to  go  to  the  Ambrosian  Library,  and  we  did  that, 
also.  We  saw  a  manuscript  of  Virgil,  with  annotations  in  the 
handwriting  of  Petrarch,  the  gentleman  who  loved  another 
man's  Laura,  and  lavished  upon  her  all  through  life  a  love  which 
was  a  clear  waste  of  the  raw  material.  It  was  sound  sentiment, 
but  bad  judgment.  It  brought  both  parties  fame,  and  created 
a  fountain  of  commiseration  for  them  in  sentimental  breasts 
that  is  running  yet.  But  who  says  a  word  in  behalf  of  poor 
Mr.  Laura?  (I  do  not  know  his  other  name.)  Who  glorifies 
him  ?  Who  bedews  him  with  tears  ?  Who  writes  poetry  about 
him?  Nobody.  How  do  you  suppose  he  liked  the  state  of 
things  that  has  given  the  world  so  much  pleasure?  How  did 
he  enjoy  having  another  man  following  his  wife  everywhere 

120 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  121 

and  making  her  name  a  familiar  word  in  every  garlic-extermi 
nating  mouth  in  Italy  with  his  sonnets  to  her  pre-empted  eye 
brows?  They  got  fame  and  sympathy — he  got  neither.  This 
is  a  peculiarly  felicitous  instance  of  what  is  called  poetical  jus 
tice.  It  is  all  very  fine ;  but  it  does  not  chime  with  my  notions 
of  right.  It  is  too  one-sided — too  ungenerous.  Let  the  world 
go  on  fretting  about  Laura  and  Petrarch  if  it  will ;  but  as  for 
me,  my  tears  and  my  lamentations  shall  be  lavished  upon  the 
unsung  defendant. 

We  saw  also  an  autograph  letter  of  Lucrezia  Borgia,  a  lady 
for  whom  I  have  always  entertained  the  highest  respect,  on  ac 
count  of  her  rare  histrionic  capabilities,  her  opulence  in  solid 
gold  goblets  made  of  gilded  wood,  her  high  distinction  as  an 
operatic  screamer,  and  the  facility  with  which  she  could  order 
a  sextuple  funeral  and  get  the  corpses  ready  for  it.  We  saw 
one  single  coarse  yellow  hair  from  Lucrezia's  head,  likewise. 
•it  awoke  emotions,  but  we  still  live.  In  this  same  library  we 
saw  some  drawings  by  Michael  Angelo  (these  Italians  call 
him  Mickel  Angelo),  and  Leonardo  da  Vinci.  (They  spell  it 
Vinci  and  pronounce  it  Vinchy;  foreigners  always  spell  better 
than  they  pronounce.)  We  reserve  our  opinion  of  these 
sketches. 

In  another  building  they  showed  us  a  fresco  Representing 
some  lions  and  other  beasts  drawing  chariots ;  and  they  seemed 
to  project  so  far  from  the  wall  that  we  took  them  to  be  sculp 
tures.  The  artist  had  shrewdly  heightened  the  delusion  by 
painting  dust  on  the  creatures'  backs,  as  if  it  had  fallen  there 
naturally  and  properly.  Smart  fellow — if  it  be  smart  to  de 
ceive  strangers. 

Elsewhere  we  saw  a  huge  Roman  amphitheater,  with  its 
stone  seats  still  in  good  preservation.  Modernized,  it  is  now 
the  scene  of  more  peaceful  recreations  than  the  exhibition  of 
a  party  of  wild  beasts  with  Christians  for  dinner.  Part  of 
the  time,  the  Milanese  use  it  for  a  race-track,  and  at  other 
seasons  they  flood  it  with  water  and  have  spirited  yacht 
ing  regattas  there.  The  guide  told  us  these  things,  and  he 
would  hardly  try  so  hazardous  an  experiment  as  the  telling  of 
a,  falsehood,  when  it  is  all  he  can  do  to  speak  the  truth  in  Eng 
lish  without  getting  the  lockjaw. 

In  another  place  we  were  shown  a  sort  of  summer  arbor, 
with  a  fence  before  it.  We  said  that  was  nothing.  We  looked 
again,  and  saw,  through  the  arbor,  an  endless  stretch  of  garden, 
and  shrubbery,  and  grassy  lawn.  We  were  perfectly  willing  to 


122  MARK  TWAIN 

go  in  there  and  rest,  but  it  could  not  be  done.  It  was  only  an 
other  delusion — a  painting  by  some  ingenious  artist  with  little 
charity  in  his  heart  for  tired  folk.  The  deception  was  perfect. 
No  one  could  have  imagined  the  park  was  not  real.  We  even 
thought  we  smelled  the  flowers  at  first. 

We  got  a  carriage  at  twilight  and  drove  in  the  shaded  ave 
nues  with  the  other  nobility,  and  after  dinner  we  took  wine  and 
ices  in  a  fine  garden  with  the  great  public.  The  music  was  ex 
cellent,  the  flowers  and  shrubbery  were  pleasant  to  the  eye,  the 
scene  vivacious,  everybody  was  genteel  and  well-behaved,  and 
the  ladies  were  slightly  mustached,  and  handsomely  dressed, 
but  very  homely. 

We  adjourned  to  a  cafe  and  played  billiards  an  hour,  and  I 
made  six  or  seven  points  by  the  doctor  pocketing  his  ball,  and 
he  made  as  many  by  my  pocketing  my  ball.  We  came  near 
making  a  carom  sometimes,  but  not  the  one  we  were  trying  to 
make.  The  table  was  of  the  usual  European  style — cushions 
dead  and  twice  as  high  as  the  balls;  the  cues  in  bad  repair. 
The  natives  play  only  a  sort  of  pool  on  them.  We  have  'never 
seen  anybody  playing  the  French  three-ball  game  yet,  arid  I 
doubt  if  there  is  any  such  game  known  in  France,  or  that  there 
lives  any  man  mad  enough  to  try  to  play  it  on  one  of  these 
European  tables.  Wre  had  to  stop  playing,  finally,  because  Dan 
got  to  sleeping  fifteen  minutes  between  the  counts  and  paying 
no  attention  to  his  marking. 

Afterward  we  walked  up  and  down  one  of  the  most  popular 
streets  for  some  time,  enjoying  other  people's  comfort  and 
wishing  we  could  export  some  of  it  to  our  restless,  driving, 
vitality-consuming  marts  at  home.  /  Just  in  this  one  matter  lies 
the  main  charm  of  life  in  Europe— comfort.  In  America,  we 
hurry — which  is  well ;  but  when  the  day's  work  is  done,  we  go^ 
on  thinking  of  losses  and  gains,  we  plan  for  the  morrow,  we^ 
even  carry  our  business  cares  to  bed  with  us,  and  toss  and  worry 
over  them  when  we  ought  to  be  restoring  our  racked  bodies 
and  brains  with  sleep.  WTe  burn  up  our  energies  with  these 
excitements,  and  either  die  early  or  drop  into  a  lean  and  mean 
old  age  at  a  time  of  life  which  they  call  a  man's  prime  in 
Europe.  When  an  acre  of  ground  has  produced  long  and  well, 
we  let  it  lie  fallow  and  rest  for  a  season ;  we  take  no  man  clear 
across  the  continent  in  the  same  coach  he  started  in — the  coach 
is  stabled  somewrhere  on  the  plains  and  its  heated  machinery 
allowed  to  cool  for  a  few  days;  when  a  razor  has  seen  long 
service  and  refuses  to  hold  an  edge,  the  barber  lays  it  &way 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  123 

for  a  few  weeks,  and  the  edge  comes  back  of  its  own  accord. 
We  bestow  thoughtful  care  upon  inanimate  objects,  but  none 
upon  ourselves.  What  a  robust  people,  what  a  nation  of 
thinkers  we  might  be,  if  we  would  onlj.Nlav  ourselves  bn  the 
shelf  occasionally  and  renew  our  e<lges !  \ 

(Tdo  envy  these  Europeans  the  comfort  they  take.  When 
the  work  of  the  day  is  done,  they  forget  it.  Some  of  them  go, 
with  wife  and  children,  to  a  beer-hall,  and  sit  quietly  and  gen 
teelly  drinking  a  mug  or  two  of  ale  and  listening  to  music; 
others  walk  the  streets,  others  drive  in  the  avenues;  others 
assemble  in  the  great  ornamental  squares  in  the  early  evening 
to  enjoy  the  sight  and  the  fragrance  of  flowers  and  to  hear 
the  military  bands  play — no  European  city  being  without  its 
fine  military  music  at  eventide ;  and  yet  others  of  the  populace 
sit  in  the  open  air  in  front  of  the  refreshment-houses  and  teat 
ices  and  drink  mild  beverages  that  could  not  harm  a  child. 
They  go  to  bed  moderately  early,  and  sleep  well.  They  are 
always  quiet,  always  orderly,  always  cheerful,  comfortable,  and 
appreciative  of  life  and  its  manifold  blessings.  One1  never 
sees  a  drunken  man  among  them.  The  change  that  has  come 
over  our  little  party  is  surprising.  Day  by  day  we  lose  some 
of  our  restlessness  and  absorb  some  of  the  spirit  of  quietude 
and  ease  that  is  in  the  tranquil  atmosphere  about  us  and  in 
the  demeanor  of  the  people.  We  grow  wise  apace.  We  begin 
to  comprehend  what  life  is  for.  . 

We  have  had  a  bath  in  Milan,  in  a  public  bath-house.  They 
were  going  to  put  all  three  of  us  in  one  bathtub,  but  we  ob 
jected.  Each  of  us  had  an  Italian  farm  on  his  back.  We 
could  have  felt  affluent  if  we  had  been  officially  surveyed  and 
fenced  in.  We  chose  to  have  three  bathtubs,  and  large  ones — 
tubs  suited  to  the  dignity  of  aristocrats  who  had  real  estate, 
and  brought  it  with  them.  After  we  were  stripped  and  had 
taken  the  first  chilly  dash,  we  discovered  that  haunting  atrocity 
that  has  embittered  our  lives  in  so  many  cities  and  villages  of 
Italy  and  France — there  was  no  soap.  I  called.  A  woman 
answered,  and  I  barely  had  time  to  throw  myself  against  the 
door — she  would  have  been  in,  in  another  second.  I  said : 

"Beware,  woman !  Go  away  from  here — go  away,  now,  or 
it  will  be  the  worse  for  you.  I  am  an  unprotected  male,  but 
I  will  preserve  my  honor  at  the  peril  of  my  life  1" 

These  words  must  have  frightened  her,  for  she  scurried 
away  very  fast. 

Dan's  voice  rose  on  the  air : 


124  MARK  TWAIN 

"Oh,  bring  some  soap,  why  don't  you!" 

The  reply  was  Italian.     Dan  resumed: 

"Soap,  you  know — soap.  That  is  what  I  want — soap. 
S-o-a-p,  soap;  s-o-p-e,  soap;  s-o-u-p,  soap.  Hurry  up!  I 
don't  know  how  you  Irish  spell  it,  but  I  want  it.  Spell  it. to 
suit  yourself,  but  fetch  it.  I'm  freezing." 

I  heard  the  doctor  say,  impressively: 

"Dan,  how  often  have  we  told  you  that  these  foreigners 
cannot  understand  English?  Why  will  you  not  depend  upon 
us?  Why  will  you  not  tell  us  what  you  want,  and  let  us  ask 
for  it  in  the  language  of  the  country?  It  would  save  us  a 
great  deal  of  the  humiliation  your  reprehensible  ignorance 
causes  us.  I  will  address  this  person  in  his  mother-tongue: 
'Here,  cospetto  !  corpo  di  Bacco !  Sacramento !  Solf  erino  !— 
Soap,  you  son  of  a  gun !"  Dan,  if  you  would  let  us  talk  for 
you,  you  would  never  expose  your  ignorant  vulgarity." 

Even  this  fluent  discharge  of  Italian  did  not  bring  the  soap 
at  once,  but  there  was  a  good  reason  for  it.  There  was  not 
such  an  article  about  the  establishment.  It  is  my  belief  that 
there  never  had  been.  They  had  to  send  far  up- town,  and  to 
several  different  places  before  they  finally  got  it,  so  they  said. 
We  had  to  wait  twenty  or  thirty  minutes.  The  same  thing 
had  occurred  the  evening  before,  at  the  hotel.  I  think  I  have 
divined  the  reason  for  this  state  of  things  at  last.  The  Eng 
lish  know  how  to  travel  comfortably,  and  they  carry  soap  with 
them;  other  foreigners  do  not  use  the  article. 

At  every  hotel  we  stop  at  we  always  have  to  send  out  for 
soap,  at  the  last  moment,  when  we  are  grooming  ourselves  for 
dinner,  and  they  put  it  in  the  bill  along  with  the  candles  find 
other  nonsense.  In  Marseilles  they  make  half  the  fancy  toile* 
soap  we  consume  in  America,  but  the  Marseillaise  only  have  j 
a  vague  theoretical  idea  of  its  use,  which  they  have  obtained 
from  books  of  travel,  just  as  they  have  acquired  an  uncertain 
notion  of  clean  shirts,  and  the  peculiarities  of  the  gorilla,  and 
other  curious  matters.  This  reminds  me  of  poor  Bluchers 
note  to  the  landlord  in  Paris : 

PARIS,  le  7  Juillet. 

Monsieur  le  Landlord — Sir :  Pourquol  don't  you  mettcs  some  savon 
in  your  bed-chambers?  Est-cc  que  vous  pcnsez  I  will  steal  it?  La 
nuit  passee  you  charged  me  pour  dcn.v  chandcllcs  when  I  only  had  one; 
hier  vous  avcz  charged  me  avcc  glace  when  I  had  none  at  ail ;  tout  Ics 
jours  you  are  coming  some  fresh  game  or  other  on  me,  mais  1'ous  ne 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  125 

pouves  pas  play  this  savon  dodge  on  me  twice.  Savon  is  a  necessary 
de  la  vie  to  anybody  but  a  Frenchman,  et  je  I'aurai  hors?  de  cet  hotel  or 
make  trouble.  You  hear  me.  Allans. 

B  LUC  HER. 

I  remonstrated  against  the  sending  of  this  note,  because  it 
was  so  mixed  up  that  the  landlord  would  never  be  able  to  make 
head  or  tail  of  it;  but  Blucher  said  he  guessed  the  old  man 
could  read  the  French  of  it  and  average  the  rest. 

Blucher's  French  is  bad  enough,  but  it  is  not  much  worse 
than  the  English  one  finds  in  advertisements  all  over  Italy 
every  day.  For  instance,  observe  the  printed  card  of  the 
hotel  we  shall  probably  stop  at  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Como : 

NOTISH 

This  hotel  which  the  best  it  is  in  Italy  and  most  superb,  is 
handsome  locate  on  the  best  situation  of  the  lake,  with  the  most 
splendid  view  near  the  Villas  Melzy,  to  the  King  of  Belgian, 
and  Serbelloni.  This  hotel  have  recently  enlarge,  do  offer  ail 
commodities  on  moderate  price,  at  the  strangers  gentlemen  who 
whish  spend  the  seasons  on  the  Lake  Come. 

How  is  that  for  a  specimen?  In  the  hotel  is  a  handsome 
little  chapel  where  an  English  clergyman  is  employed  to  preach 
to  such  of  the  guests  of  the  house  as  hail  from  England  and 
America,  and  this  fact  is  also  set  forth  in  barbarous  English 
in  the  same  advertisement.  Wouldn't  you  have  supposed  that 
the  adventurous  linguist  who  frame4  the  card  would  have 
known  enough  to  submit  it  to  that  clergyman  before  he  sent 
it  to  the  printer? 

Here,  in  Milan,  in  an  ancient  tumble-down  ruin  of  a  church, 
is  the  mournful  wreck  of  the  most  celebrated  painting  in  the 
world — "The  Last  Supper,"  by  Leonardo  da  Vinci.  We  are 
not  infallible  judges  of  pictures,  but,  of  course,  we  went  there 
to  see  this  wonderful  painting,  once  so  beautiful,  always  so 
worshipped  by  masters  in  art,  and  forever  to  be  famous  in  song 
and  story.  And  the  first  thing  that  occurred  was  the  infliction 
on  us  of  a  placard  fairly  reeking  with  wretched  English.  Take 
a  morsel  of  it : 

Bartholomew  (that  is  the  first  figure  on  the  left  hand  side  at  the 
spectator),  uncertain  and  doubtful  about  what  he  thinks  to  have  heard, 
and  upon  which  he  wants  to  be  assured  by  himself  at  Christ  and  by 
no  others. 

Good,  isn't  it?    And  then  Peter  is  described  as  "argumenting 


126  MARK  TWAIN 

in   a   threatening   and   angrily   condition   at   Judas    Iscariot." 

This  paragraph  recalls  the  picture.  "The  Last  Supper"  is 
painted  on  the  dilapidated  wall  of  what  was  a  little  chapel  at 
tached  to  the  main  church  in  ancient  times,  I  suppose.  It  is 
battered  and  scarred  in  every  direction,  and  stained  and  dis 
colored  by  time,  and  Napoleon's  horses  kicked  the  legs  off 
most  the  disciples  when  they  (the  horses,  not  the  disciples) 
were  stabled  there  more  than  half  a  century  ago. 

I  recognized  the  old  picture  in  a  moment — the  Saviour  with 
bowed  head  seated  at  the  center  of  a  long,  rough  table  with  scat 
tering  fruits  and  dishes  upon  it,  and  six  disciples  on  either  side 
in  their  long  robes,  talking  to  each  other — the  picture  from 
which  all  engravings  and  all  copies  have  been  made  for  three 
centuries.  Perhaps  no  living  man  has  ever  known  an  attempt  to 
paint  the  Lord's  Supper  differently.  The  world  seems  to  have 
become  settled  in  the  belief,  long  ago,  that  it  is  not  possible  for 
human  genius  to  outdo  this  creation  of  Da  Vinci's.  I  suppose 
painters  will  go  on  copying  it  as  long  as  any  of  the  original 
is  left  visible  to  the  eye.  There  were  a  dozen  easels  in  the  room, 
and  as  many  artists  transferring  the  great  picture  to  their  can 
vases.  Fifty  proofs  of  steel  engravings  and  lithographs  were 
scattered  around,  too.  And  as  usual,  I  could  not  help  noticing 
how  superior  the  copies  were  to  the  original,  that  is,  to  my  in 
experienced  eye.  Wherever  you  find  a  Raphael,  a  Rubens,  a 
Michael  Angelo,  a  Caracci,  or  a  Da  Vinci  (and  we  see  them 
every  day)  you  find  artists  copying  them,  and  the  copies  are 
always  the  handsomest.  Maybe  the  originals  were  handsome 
when  they  were  new,  but  they  are  not  now. 

This  picture  is  about  thirty  feet  long,  and  ten  or  twelve 
high,  I  should  think,  and  the  figures  are  at  least  life-size.  It 
is  one  of  the  largest  paintings  in  Europe. 

The  colors  are  dimmed  with  age;  the  countenances  are 
scaled  and  marred,  and  nearly  all  expression  is  gone  from  them ; 
the  hair  is  a  dead  blur  upon  the  wall,  and  there  is  no  life  in  the 
eyes.  Only  the  attitudes  are  certain. 

People  come  here  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  and  glorify 
this  masterpiece.  They  stand  entranced  before  it  with  bated 
breath  and  parted  lips,  and  when  they  speak,  it  is  only  in  the 
catchy  ejaculations  of  rapture: 

"Oh,  wonderful!" 

"Such  expression!" 

"Such  grace  of  attitude !" 

"Such  dignity!" 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  127 

"Such  faultless  drawing!" 

"Such  matchless  coloring!" 

"Such  feeling!" 

"What  delicacy  of  touch !" 

"What  sublimity  of  conception!" 

"A  vision !  a  vision !" 

I  only  envy  these  people;  I  envy  them  their  honest  admira 
tion,  if  it  be  honest — their  delight,  if  they  feel  delight.  I  har 
bor  no  animosity  toward  any  of  them.  But  at  the  same  time 
the  thought  will  intrude  itself  upon  me,  How  can  they  see 
what  is  not  visible?  What  would  you  think  of  a  man  who 
looked  at  some  decayed,  blind,  toothless,  pockmarked  Cleopatra, 
and  said:  "What  matchless  beauty!  What  soul!  What  ex 
pression  !"  What  would  you  think  of  a  man  who  gazed  upon 
a  dingy,  foggy  sunset,  and  said:  "What  sublimity!  what  feel 
ing!  what  richness  of  coloring!"  What  would  you  think  of  a 
man  who  stared  in  ecstasy  upon  a  desert  of  stumps  and  said : 
"Oh,  my  soul,  my  beating  heart,  what  a  noble  forest  is  here !" 

You  would  think  that  those  men  had  an  astonishing  talent 
for  seeing  things  that  had  already  passed  away.  It  was  what 
I  thought  when  I  stood  before  the  "Last  Supper"  and  heard 
men  apostrophizing  wonders  and  beauties  and  perfections 
which  had  faded  out  of  the  picture  and  gone,  a  hundred  years 
before  they  were  born.  We  can  imagine  the  beauty  that  was 
once  in  an  aged  face;  we  can  imagine  the  forest  if  we  see  the 
stumps ;  but  we  cannot  absolutely  see  things  when  they  are  not 
there.  I  am  willing  to  believe  that  the  eye  of  the  practised 
artist  can  rest  upon  the  "Last  Supper"  and  renew  a  luster 
where  only  a  hint  of  it  is  left,  supply  a  tint  that  has  faded  away, 
restore  an  expression  that  is  gone;  patch,  and  color,  and  add 
to  the  dull  canvas  until  at  last  its  figure  shall  stand  before  him 
aglow  with  life,  the  feeling,  the  freshness,  yea,  with  all  the 
noble  beauty  that  was  theirs  when  first  they  came  from  the 
hand  of  the  master.  But  /  cannot  work  this  miracle.  Can 
those  other  uninspired  visitors  do  it,  or  do  they  only  happily 
imagine  they  do? 

After  reading  so  much  about  it,  I  am  satisfied  that  the 
"Last  Supper"  was  a  very  miracle  of  art  once.  But  it  was  three 
hundred  years  ago. 

It  vexes  me  to  hear  people  talk  so  glibly  of  "feeling,"  "ex- 
presssion,"  "tone,"  and  those  other  easily  acquired  and  inex 
pensive  technicalities  of  art  that  make  such  a  fine  show  in  con 
versations  concerning  pictures.  There  is  not  one  man  in 


128  MARK  TWAIN 

seventy-five  hundred  that  can  tell  what  a  pictured  face  is  in 
tended  to  express.  There  is  not  one  man  in  five  hundred  that 
can  go  into  a  court-room  and  be  sure  that  he  will  not  mistake 
some  harmless  innocent  of  a  jury-man  for  the  black-hearted 
assassin  on  trial.  Yet  such  people  talk  of  "character"  and  pre 
sume  to  interpret  "expression"  in  pictures.  There  is  an  old 
story  that  Matthews,  the  actor,  was  once  lauding  the  ability 
of  the  human  face  to  express  the  passions  and  emotions  hidden 
in  the  breast.  He  said  the  countenance  could  disclose  what 
was  passing  in  the  heart  plainer  than  the  tongue  could. 

"Now,"  he  said,  "observe  my  face — what  does  it  express?" 

"Despair !" 

"Bah,  it  expresses  peaceful  resignation!  What  does  this 
express  ?" 

"Rage!" 

"Stuff!  it  means  terror!     This!" 

"Imbecility !" 

"Fool!     It  is  smothered  ferocity!    Now  this!" 

"Joy!" 

"Oh,  perdition !    Any  ass  can  see  it  means  insanity !" 

Expression !  People  coolly  pretend  to  read  it  who  would 
think  themselves  presumptuous  if  they  pretended  to  interpret 
the  hieroglyphics  on  the  obelisk  of  Luxor — yet  they  are  fully 
as  competent  to  do  the  one  thing  as  the  other.  I  have  heard 
two  very  intelligent  critics  speak  of  Murillo's  "Immaculate 
Conception"  (now  in  the  museum  at  Seville)  within  the  past 
few  days.  One  said: 

"Oh,  the  Virgin's  face  is  full  of  the  ecstasy  of  a  joy  that 
is  complete — that  leaves  nothing  more  to  be  desired  on  earth !" 

Che  other  said : 

"Ah,  that  wonderful  face  is  so  humble,  so  pleading — it  says 
as  plainly  as  words  could  say  it :  'I  fear ;  I  tremble ;  I  am  un 
worthy.  But  Thy  will  be  done ;  sustain  Thou  Thy  servant !' ' 

The  reader  can  see  the  picture  in  any  drawing-room;  it  can 
be  easily  recognized ;  the  Virgin  (the  only  young  and  really 
beautiful  Virgin  that  was  ever  painted  by  one  of  the  old  masters, 
some  of  us  think)  stands  in  the  crescent  of  the  new  moon,  with 
a  multitude  of  cherubs  hovering  about  her,  and  more  coming ; 
her  hands  are  crossed  upon  her  breast,  and  upon  her  uplifted 
countenance  falls  a  glory  out  of  the  heavens.  The  reader  may 
amuse  himself,  if  he  chooses,  in  trying  to  determine  which  of 
these  gentlemen  read  the  Virgin's  "expression"  aright,  or  if 
either  of  them  did  it. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  129 

Any  one  who  is  acquainted  with  the  old  masters  will  com 
prehend  how  much  the  "Last  Supper"  is  damaged  when  I  say 
that  the  spectator  cannot  really  tell,  now,  whether  the  disciples 
are  Hebrews  or  Italians.  These  ancient  painters  never  suc 
ceeded  in  denationalizing  themselves.  The  Italian  artists 
painted  Italian  Virgins,  the  Dutch  painted  Dutch  Virgins,  the 
Virgins  of  the  French  painters  were  Frenchwomen — none  of 
them  ever  put  into  the  face  of  the  Madonna  that  indescribable 
something  wrhich  proclaims  the  Jewess,  whether  you  find  her 
in  New  York,  in  Constantinople,  in  Paris,  Jerusalem,  or  in  the 
Empire  of  Morocco.  I  saw  in  the  Sandwich  Islands,  once,  a 
picture,  copied  by  a  talented  German  artist  from  an  engraving 
in  one  of  the  American  illustrated  papers.  It  was  an  allegory, 
representing  Mr.  Davis  in  the  act  of  signing  a  secession  act  or 
some  such  document.  Over  him  hovered  the  ghost  of  Wash 
ington  in  warning  attitude,  and  in  the  background  a  troop  of 
shadowy  soldiers  in  Continental  uniform  were  limping  with 
shoeless,  bandaged  feet  through  a  driving  snow-storm.  Valley 
Forge  was  suggested,  of  course.  The  copy  seemed  accurate, 
and  yet  there  was  a  discrepancy  somewhere.  After  a  long  ex 
amination  I  discovered  what  it  was — the  shadowy  soldiers  were 
all  Germans !  Jeff  Davis  was  a  German !  even  the  hovering 
ghost  was  a  German  ghost!  The  artist  had  unconsciously 
worked  his  nationality  into  the  picture.  To  tell  the  truth,  I 
am  getting  a  little  perplexed  about  John  the  Baptist  and  his  por 
traits.  In  France  I  finally  grew  reconciled  to  him  as  a  French 
man  ;  here  he  is  unquestionably  an  Italian.  What  next  ?  Can 
it  be  possible  that  the  painters  make  John  the  Baptist  a 
Spaniard  in  Madrid  and  an  Irishman  in  Dublin? 

We  took  an  open  barouche  and  drove  two  miles  out  of 
Milan  to  "see  ze  echo,"  as  the  guide  expressed  it.  The  road 
was  smooth,  it  was  bordered  by  trees,  fields,  and  grassy  mea 
dows,  and  the  soft  air  was  filled  with  the  odor  of  flowers. 
Troops  of  picturesque  peasant-girls,  coming  from  work,  hooted 
at  us,  shouted  at  us,  made  all  manner  of  game  of  us,  and  en 
tirely  delighted  me.  My  long-cherished  judgment  was  con 
firmed.  I  always  did  think  those  frowsy,  romantic,  unwashed 
peasant-girls  I  had  read  so  much  about  in  poetry  were  a  glar 
ing  fraud. 

We  enjoyed  our  jaunt.  It  was  an  exhilarating  relief  from 
tiresome  sight-seeing. 

We  distressed  ourselves  very  little  about  the  astonishing  echo 
the  guide  talked  so  much  about.  We  were  growing  accustomed 


130  MARK  TWAIN 

to  encomiums  on  wonders  that  too  often  proved  no  wonders  at 
all.  And  so  we  were  most  happily  disappointed  to  find  in  the 
sequel  that  the  guide  had  even  failed  to  rise  to  the  magnitude 
of  his  subject. 

We  arrived  at  a  tumble-down  old  rookery  called  the  Palazzo 
Simonetti — a  massive  hewn-stone  affair  occupied  by  a  family 
of  ragged  Italians.  A  good-looking  young  girl  conducted  us 
to  a  window  on  the  second  floor  which  looked  out  on  a  court 
walled  on  three  sides  by  tall  buildings.  She  put  her  head  out 
at  the  window  and  shouted.  The  echo  answered  more  times 
than  we  could  count.  She  took  a  speaking-trumpet  and  through 
it  she  shouted,  sharp  and  quick,  a  single 

"Ha !"    The  echo  answered : 

"Ha ha!  ! ha! ha!— ha!-ha!  ha  h-a-a-a- 

a-a!"  and  finally  went  off  into  a  rollicking  convulsion  of  the 
j oiliest  laughter  that  could  be  imagined.  It  was  so  joyful,  so 
long-continued,  so  perfectly  cordial  and  hearty,  that  every 
body  was  forced  to  join  in.  There  was  no  resisting  it. 

Then  the  girl  took  a  gun  and  fired  it.  We  stood  ready  to 
count  the  astonishing  clatter  of  reverberations.  We  could  not 
say  one,  two,  three,  fast  enough,  but  we  could  dot  our  note 
books  with  our  pencil-points  almost  rapidly  enough  to  take 
down  a  sort  of  shorthand  report  of  the  result.  My  page  re 
vealed  the  following  account.  I  could  not  keep  up,  but  I  did 
as  well  as  I  could. 

I  set  down  fifty-two  distinct  repetitions,  and  then  the  echo 
got  the  advantage  of  me.  The  doctor  set  down  sixty-four, 
and  thenceforth  the  echo  moved  too  fast  for  him,  also.  After 
the  separate  concussions  could  no  longer  be  noted,  the  rever 
berations  dwindled  to  a  wild,  long-sustained  clatter  of  sounds 
such  as  a  watchman's  rattle  produces.  It  is  likely  that  this 
is  the  most  remarkable  echo  in  the  world. 

The  doctor,  in  jest,  offered  to  kiss  the  young  girl,  for  a 
franc!  The  commonest  gallantry  compelled  him  to  stand  by 
his  offer,  and  so  he  paid  the  franc  and  took  the  kiss.  She  was 
a  philosopher.  She  said  a  franc  was  a  good  thing  to  have,  and 
she  did  not  care  anything  for  one  paltry  kiss,  because  she  had 
a  million  left.  Then  our  comrade,  always  a  shrewd  business 
man,  offered  to  take  the  whole  cargo  at  thirty  days,  but  that 
little  financial  scheme  was  a  failure. 


CHAPTER  XX 

WE  left  Milan  by  rail.    The  cathedral  six  or  seven  miles 
behind    us — vast,    dreamy,   bluish,    snow-clad   moun 
tains    twenty    miles    in    front    of    us, — these    were 
the   accented   points   in   the    scenery.      The   more    immediate 
scenery  consisted  of  fields  and  farmhouses  outside  the  car  and 
a  monster-headed  dwarf  and  a  mustacjied  woman  inside  it. 
These  latter  were  not  show-people.    0Jas,  deformity  and  fe-  f  J 
male  beards  are  too  common  in  Italy  to  attract  attention^) 

We  passed  through  a  range  of  wild,  picturesque  hills,  steep, 
wooded,  cone-shaped,  with  rugged  crags  projecting  here  and 
there,  and  with  dwellings  and  ruinous  castles  perched  away 
up  toward  the  drifting  clouds.  We  lunched  at  the  curious  old 
town  of  Como,  at  the  foot  of  the  lake,  and  then  took  the  small 
steamer  and  had  an  afternoon's  pleasure  excursion  to  this  place, 
— Bellagio. 

When  we  walked  ashore,  a  party  of  policemen  (people  whose 
cocked  hats  and  showy  uniforms  would  shame  the  finest  uni 
form  in  the  military  service  of  the  United  States)  put  us  into 
a  little  stone  cell  and  locked  us  in.  We  had  the  whole  pas 
senger-list  for  company,  but  their  room  would  have  been  pref 
erable,  for  there  was  no  light,  there  were  no  windows,  no 
ventilation.  It  was  close  and  hot.  We  were  much  crowded. 
It  was  the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta  on  a  small  scale.  Presently 
a  smoke  rose  about  our  feet — a  smoke  that  smelt  of  all  the 
dead  things  of  earth,  of  all  the  putrefaction  and  corruption 
imaginable. 

We  were  there  five  minutes,  and  when  we  got  out  it  was 
hard  to  tell  which  of  us  carried  the  vilest  fragrance. 

These  miserable  outcasts  called  that  "fumigating"  us,  and 
the  term  was  a  tame  one,  indeed.  They  fumigated  us  to  guard 
themselves  against  the  cholera,  though  we  hailed  from  no  in 
fected  port.  We  had  left  the  cholera  far  behind  us  all  the  time. 
However,  they  must  keep  epidemics  away  somehow  or  other, 
and  fumigation  is  cheaper  than  soap.  They  must  either  wash 
themselves  or  fumigate  other  people.  Some  of  the  lower  classes 
had  rather  die  than  wash,  but  the  fumigation  of  strangers 

131 


132  MARK  TWAIN 

causes  them  no  pangs.  They  need  no  fumigation  themselves. 
Their  habits  make  it  unnecessary.  They  carry  their  preventive 
with  them ;  they  sweat  and  fumigate  all  the  day  long.  I  trust 
I  am  a  humble  and  a  consistent  Christian.  I  try  to  do  what 
is  right.  I  know  it  is  my  duty  to  "pray  for  them  that  despite-- 
fully  use  me" ;  and  therefore,  hard  as  it  is,  I  shall  still  try  to 
pray  for  these  fumigating,  macaroni-stuffing  organ-grinders. 

Our  hotel  sits  at  the  water 's  edge — at  least  its  front  garden 
does — and  we  walk  among  the  shrubbery  and  smoke  at  twi 
light;  we  look  afar  off  at  Switzerland  and  the  Alps,  and  feeJ 
an  indolent  willingness  to  look  no  closer ;  we  go  down  the  steps 
and  swim  in  the  lake;  we  take  a  shapely  little  boat  and  sail 
abroad  among  the  reflections  of  the  stars;  lie  on  the  thwarts 
and  listen  to  the  distant  laughter,  the  singing,  the  soft  melody 
of  flutes  and  guitars  that  comes  floating  across  the  water  from 
pleasuring  gondolas;  we  close  the  evening  with  exasperating 
billiards  on  one  of  those  same  old  execrable  tables.  A  mid 
night  luncheon  in  our  ample  bed-chamber ;  a  final  smoke  in  its 
contracted  veranda  facing  the  water,  the  gardens,  and  the 
mountains;  a  summing  up  of  the  day's  events.  Then  to  bed, 
with  drowsy  brains  harassed  with  a  mad  panorama  that  mixes 
up  pictures  of  France,  of  Italy,  of  the  ship,  of  the  ocean,  of 
home,  in  grotesque  and  bewildering  disorder.  Then  a  melting 
away  of  familiar  faces,  of  cities  and  of  tossing  waves,  into  a 
great  calm  of  forget  fulness  and  peace. 

After  which,  the  nightmare. 

Breakfast  in  the  morning,  and  then  the  lake. 

I  did  not  like  it  yesterday.  I  thought  Lake  Tahoe  was  much 
finer.  I  have  to  confess  now,  however,  that  my  judgment  erred 
somewhat,  though  not  extravagantly.  I  always  had  an  idea 
that  Como  was  a  vast  basin  of  water,  like  Tahoe,  shut  in  by 
great  mountains.  Well,  the  border  of  huge  mountains  is  here, 
but  the  lake  itself  is  not  a  basin.  It  is  as  crooked  as  any  brook, 
and^  only  from  one-quarter  to  two-thirds  as  wide  as  the  Mis 
sissippi.  There  is  not  a  yard  of  low  ground  on  either  side  of 
it — nothing  but  endless  chains  of  mountains  that  spring  ab 
ruptly  from  the  water's  edge,  and  tower  to  altitudes  varying 
from  a  thousand  to  two  thousand  feet.  Their  craggy  sides 
are  clothed  with  vegetation,  and  white  specks  of  houses  peep 
out  from  the  luxuriant  foliage  everywhere;  they  are  even 
perched  upon  jutting  and  picturesque  pinnacles  a  thousand  feet 
above  your  head. 

Again,  for  miles  along  the  shores,  handsome  country-seats 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  133 

surrounded  by  gardens  and  groves,  sit  fairly  in  the  water, 
sometimes  in  nooks  carved  by  Nature  out  of  the  vine-hung 
precipices,  and  with  no  ingress  or  egress  save  by  boats.  Some 
have  great  broad  stone  staircases  leading  down  to  the  water, 
with  heavy  stone  balustrades  ornamented  with  statuary  and 
and  fancifully  adorned  with  creeping  vines  and  bright-colored 
flowers — for  all  the  world  like  a  drop-curtain  in  a  theater,  and 
lacking  nothing  but  long-waisted,  high-heeled  women  and 
plumed  gallants  in  silken  tights  coming  down  to  go  serenading 
in  the  splendid  gondola  in  waiting. 

A  great  feature  of  Como's  attractiveness  is  the  multitude  of 
pretty  houses  and  gardens  that  cluster  upon  its  shores  and  on 
its  mountainsides.  They  look  so  snug  and  so  homelike,  and  at 
eventide  when  everything  seems  to  slumber,  and  the  music  of 
the  vesper-bells  comes  stealing  over  the  water,  one  almost  be 
lieves  that  nowhere  else  than  on  the  Lake  of  Como  can  there 
be  found  such  a  paradise  of  tranquil  repose. 

From  my  window  here  in  Bellagio,  I  have  a  view  of  the  other 
side  of  the  lake  now,  which  is  as  beautiful  as  a  picture.  A 
scarred  and  wrinkled  precipice  rises  to  a  height  of  eighteen 
hundred  feet;  on  a  tiny  bench  half-way  up  its  vast  wall,  sits 
a  little  snowflake  of  a  church,  no  bigger  than  a  martin-box,  ap 
parently  ;  skirting  the  base  of  the  cliff  are  a  hundred  orange 
groves  and  gardens,  flecked  with  glimpses  of  the  white  dwell 
ings  that  are  buried  in  them ;  in  front,  three  or  four  gondolas 
lie  idle  upon  the  water — and  in  the  burnished  mirror  of  the 
lake,  mountain,  chapel,  houses,  groves,  and  boats  are  counter 
feited  so  brightly  and  so  clearly  that  one  scarce  knows  where 
the  reality  leaves  off  and  the  reflection  begins ! 

The  surroundings  of  this  picture  are  fine.  A  mile  away,  a 
grove-plumed  promontory  juts  far  into  the  lake  and  glasses  its 
palace  in  the  blue  depths;  in  midstream  a  boat  is  cutting  the 
shining  surface  and  leaving  a  long  track  behind,  like  a  ray  of 
light ;  the  mountains  beyond  are  veiled  in  a  dreamy  purple  haze  ; 
far  in  the  opposite  direction  a  tumbled  mass  of  domes  and  ver 
dant  slopes  and  valleys  bars  the  lake,  and  here,  indeed,  does 
distance  lend  enchantment  to  the  view — for  on  this  broad  can 
vas,  sun  and  clouds  and  the  richest  of  atmospheres  have  blended 
a  thousand  tints  together,  and  over  its  surface  the  filmy  lights 
and  shadows  drift,  hour  after  hour,  and  glorify  it  with  a  beauty 
that  seems  reflected  out  of  Heaven  itself.  Beyond  all  question, 
this  is  the  most  voluptuous  scene  we  have  yet  looked  upon. 

Last  night  the  scenery  was  striking  and  picturesque.     On 


134  MARK  TWAIN 

the  other  side  crags  and  trees  and  snowy  houses  were  reflected 
in  the  lake  with  a  wonderful  distinctness,  and  streams  of  light 
from  many  a  distant  window  shot  far  abroad  over  the  still 
waters.  On  this  side,  near  at  hand,  great  mansions,  white 
with  moonlight,  glared  out  from  the  midst  of  masses  of  foliage 
that  lay  black  and  shapeless  in  the  shadows  that  fell  from  the 
cliff  above — and  down  in  the  margin  of  the  lake  every  feature 
of  the  weird  vision  was  faithfully  repeated. 

To-day  we  have  idled  through  a  wonder  of  a  garden  attached 
to  a  ducal  estate — but  enough  of  description  is  enough,  I  judge. 
I  suspect  that  this  was  the  same  place  the  gardener's  son  de 
ceived  the  Lady  of  Lyons  with,  but  I  do  not  know.  You  may 
have  heard  of  the  passage  somewhere: 

A  deep  vale, 

Shut  out  by  Alpine  hills  from  the  rude  world, 
Near  a  clear  lake  margined  by  fruits  of  gold 
And  whispering  myrtles : 
Glassing    softest    skies,    cloudless, 
Save   with   rare  and   roseate  shadows ; 
A  palace,   lifting  to  eternal  heaven  its  marbled  walls, 
From  out  a  glossy  bower  of  coolest  foliage  musical 
with  birds. 

That  is  all  very  well,  except  the  "clear"  part  of  the  lake. 
It  certainly  is  clearer  than  a  great  many  lakes,  but  how  dull 
its  waters  are  compared  with  the  wonderful  transparence  of 
Lake  Tahoe !  I  speak  of  the  north  shore  of  Tahoe,  where  one 
can  count  the  scales  on  a  trout  at  a  depth  of  a  hundred  and 
eighty  feet.  I  have  tried  to  get  this  statement  off  at  par  here, 
but  with  no  success;  so  I  have  been  obliged  to  negotiate  it  at 
fifty  per  cent,  discount.  At  this  rate  I  find  some  takers;  per 
haps  the  reader  will  receive  it  on  the  same  terms — ninety  feet 
instead  of  one  hundred  and  eighty.  But  let  it  be  remembered. 
that  those  are  forced  terms — sheriff's-sale  prices.  As  far  as 
I  am  privately  concerned,  I  abate  not  a  jot  of  the  original 
assertion  that  in  those  strangely  magnifying  waters  one  may 
count  the  scales  on  a  trout  (a  trout  of  the  large  kind)  at  a  depth 
of  a  hundred  and  eighty  feet — may  see  every  pebble  on  the 
bottom — might  even  count  a  paper  of  dray-pins.  People  talk 
of  the  transparent  waters  of  the  Mexican  Bay  of  Acapulco, 
but  in  my  own  experience  I  know  they  cannot  compare  with 
those  I  am  speaking  of.  I  have  fished  for  trout  in  Tahoe,  and 
at  a  measured  depth  of  eighty-four  feet  I  have  seen  them  put 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  135 

their  noses  to  the  bait  and  I  could  see  their  gills  open  and  shut. 
I  could  hardly  have  seen  the  trout  themselves  at  that  distance 
in  the  open  air. 

As  I  go  back  in  spirit  and  recall  that  noble  sea,  reposing 
among  the  snow-peaks  six  thousand  feet  above  the  ocean,  the 
conviction  comes  strong  upon  me  again  that  Como  would  only 
seem  a  bedizened  little  courtier  in  that  august  presence. 

Sorrow  and  misfortune  overtake  the  legislature  that  still 
from  year  to  year  permits  Tahoe  to  retain  its  unmusical  cog 
nomen  !  Tahoe !  It  suggests  no  crystal  waters,  no  picturesque 
shores,  no  sublimity.  Tahoe  for  a  sea  in  the  clouds;  a  sea 
that  has  character,  and  asserts  it  in  solemn  calms,  at  times,  at 
times  in  savage  storms ;  a  sea,  whose  royal  seclusion  is  guarded 
by  a  cordon  of  sentinel  peaks  that  lift  their  frosty  fronts  nine 
thousand  feet  above  the  level  world ;  a  sea  whose  every  aspect 
is  impressive,  whose  belongings  are  all  beautiful,  whose  lonely 
majesty  types  the  Deity ! 

Tahoe  means  grasshoppers.  It  means  grasshopper  soup.  It 
is  Indian,  and  suggestive  of  Indians.  They  say  it  is  Pi-ute — 
possibly  it  is  Digger.  I  am  satisfied  it  was  named  by  the  Dig 
gers — those  degraded  savages  who  roast  their  dead  relatives, 
then  mix  the  human  grease  and  ashes  of  bones  with  tar,  and 
"gaum"  it  thick  all  over  their  heads  and  foreheads  and  ears, 
and  go  caterwauling  about  the  hills  and  call  it  mourning.  These 
are  the  gentry  that  named  the  lake. 

People  say  that  Tahoe  means  "Silver  Lake" —  "Limpid 
Water" — "Falling  Leaf."  Bosh!  It  means  grasshopper  soup, 
the  favorite  dish  of  the  Digger  tribe — and  of  the  Pi-utes  as 
well.  It  isn't  worth  while,  in  these  practical  times,  for  people 
to  talk  about  Indian  poetry — there  never  was  any  in  them — 
except  in  the  Fenimore  Cooper  Indians.  But  they  are  an  ex 
tinct  tribe  that  never  existed.  I  know  the  Noble  Red  Man. 
I  have  camped  with  the  Indians;  I  have  been  on  the  war-path 
with  them,  taken  part  in  the  chase  with  them — for  grass 
hoppers;  helped  them  steal  cattle;  I  have  roamed  with  them, 
scalped  them,  had  them  for  breakfast.  I  would  gladly  eat  the 
whole  race  if  I  had  a  chance. 

But  I  am  growing  unreliable.  I  will  return  to  my  com 
parison  of  the  lakes.  Como  is  a  little  deeper  than  Tahoe,  if 
people  here  tell  the  truth.  They  say  it  is  eighteen  hundred 
feet  deep  at  this  point,  but  it  does  not  look  a  dead  enough  blue 
for  that.  Tahoe  is  one  thousand  five  hundred  and  twenty-five 
feet  deep  in  the  center,  by  the  State  Geologist's  measurement. 


136  MARK  TWAIN 

They  say  the  great  peak  opposite  this  town  is  five  thousand 
feet  high ;  but  I  feel  sure  that  three  thousand  feet  of  that  state 
ment  is  a  good,  honest  lie.  The  lake  is  a  mile  wide  here, 
and  maintains  about  that  width  from  this  point  to 
its  northern  extremity — which  is  distant  sixteen  miles ;  from 
here  to  its  southern  extremity — say  fifteen  miles — it  is  not  over 
half  a  mile  in  any  place,  I  should  think.  Its  snow-clad  moun 
tains  one  hears  so  much  about  are  only  seen  occasionally,  and 
then  in  the  distance,  the  Alps.  Tahoe  is  from  ten  to  eighteen 
miles  wide,  and  its  mountains  shut  it  in  like  a  wall.  Their 
summits  are  never  free  from  snow  the  year  round.  One  thing 
about  it  is  very  strange :  it  never  has  even  a  skim  of  ice  upon 
its  surface,  although  lakes  in  the  same  range  of  mountains, 
lying  in  a  lower  and  warmer  temperature,  freeze  over  in  winter. 
It  is  cheerful  to  meet  a  shipmate  in  these  out-of-the-way 
places  and  compare  notes  with  him.  We  have  found  one  of 
ours  here — an  old  soldier  of  the  wrar,  who  is  seeking  bloodless 
adventures  and  rest  from  his  campaigns,  in  these  sunny  lands.1 

1Col.  J.  HERON  FOSTER,  editor  of  a  Pittsburgh  journal,  and  a  most 
estimable  gentleman.  As  these  sheets  are  being  prepared  for  the  press, 
I  am  pained  to  learn  of  his  decease  shortly  after  his  return  home. — M.  T. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

WE  voyaged  by  steamer  down  the  Lago  di  Lecco,  through 
wild  mountain  scenery,  and  by  hamlets  and  villas, 
and  disembarked  at  the  town  of  Lecco.  They  said 
it  was  two  hours,  by  carriage,  to  the  ancient  city  of  Bergamo, 
and  that  we  would  arrive  there  in  good  season  for  the  railway- 
train.  We  got  an  open  barouche  and  a  wild,  boisterous  driver, 
and  set  out.  It  was  delightful.  We  had  a  fast  team  and  a  per 
fectly  smooth  road.  There  were  towering  cliffs  on  our  left, 
and  the  pretty  Lago  di  Lecco  on  our  right,  and  every  now  and 
then  it  rained  on  us.  Just  before  starting,  the  driver  picked 
up,  in  the  street,  a  stump  of  a  cigar  an  inch  long,  and  put  it  in 
his  mouth.  \Vhen  he  had  carried  it  thus  about  an  hour,  I 
thought  it  would  be  only  Christian  charity  to  give  him  a  light. 
I  handed  him  my  cigar,  which  I  had  just  lit,  and  he  put  it  in 
his  mouth  and  returned  his  stump  to  his  pocket !  I  never  saw 
a  more  sociable  man.  At  least  I  never  saw  a  man  who  was 
more  sociable  on  a  short  acquaintance. 

We  saw  interior  Italy  now.  The  houses  were  of  solid  stone, 
and  not  often  in  good  repair.  The  peasants  and  their  children 
were  idle,  as  a  general  thing,  and  the  donkeys  and  chickens 
made  themselves  at  home  in  drawing-room  and  bed-chamber 
and  were  not  molested.  The  drivers  of  each  and  every  one  of 
the  slow-moving  market-carts  we  met  were  stretched  in  the  sun 
upon  their  merchandise,  sound  asleep.  Every  three  or  four 
hundred  yards,  it  seemed  to  me,  we  came  upon  the  shrine  of 
some  saint  or  other — a  rude  picture  of  him  built  into  a  huge 
cross  or  a  stone  pillar  by  the  roadside.  Some  of  the  pictures 
of  the  Saviour  were  curiosities  in  their  way.  They  represented 
him  stretched  upon  the  cross,  his  countenance  distorted  with 
agony.  From  the  wounds  of  the  crown  of  thorns;  from  the 
pierced  side;  from  the  mutilated  hands  and  feet;  from  the 
scourged  body — from  every  handbreadth  of  his  person,  streams 
of  blood  were  flowing!  Such  a  gory,  ghastly  spectacle  would 
frighten  the  children  out  of  their  senses,  I  should  think.  There 
were  some  unique  auxiliaries  to  the  painting  which  added  to 
its  spirited  effect.  These  were  genuine  wooden  and  iron  im- 

137 


138  MARK  TWAIN 

plements,  and  were  prominently  disposed  round  about  the 
figure :  a  bundle  of  nails ;  the  hammer  to  drive  them ;  the 
sponge:  the  reed  that  supported  it;  the  cup  of  vinegar;  the 
ladder  for  the  ascent  of  the  cross;  the  spear  that  pierced  the 
Saviour's  side.  The  crown  of  thorns  was  made  of  real  thorns, 
and  was  nailed  to  the  sacred  head.  In  some  Italian  church 
paintings,  even  by  the  old  masters,  the  Saviour  and  the  Virgin 
wear  silver  or  gilded  crowns  that  are  fastened  to  the  pictured 
head  with  nails.  The  effect  is  as  grotesque  as  it  is  incongruous. 
(Here  and  there,  on  the  fronts  of  roadside  inns,  we  found 
jhuge,  coarse  frescoes  of  suffering  martyrs  like  those  in  the 
shrines.  It  could  not  have  diminished  their  sufferings  any  to 
be  so  uncouthly  represented.  We  were  in  the  heart  and  home 
of  priestcraft — of  a  happy,  cheerful,  contented  ignorance,  sup 
erstition,  degradation,  poverty,  indolence,  and  everlasting  un 
aspiring  worthlessness.  And  we  said  fervently,  It  suits  these 
people  precisely ;  let  them  enjoy  it,  along  with  the  other  animals, 
and  Heaven  forbid  that  they  be  molested.  We  feel  no  malice 
toward  these  fumigatorsT) 

We  passed  through  the  strangest,  funniest,  undreamt-of  old 
towns,  wedded  to  the  customs  and  steeped  in  the  dreams  of  the 
elder  ages,  and  perfectly  unaware  that  the  world  turns  round ! 
And  perfectlyjLtidifferent,  too,  as  to  whether  it  turns  round  or 
.stands  still.  (They  have  nothing  to  do  but  eat  and  sleep  and 
sleep  and  eat,  and  toil  a  little  when  they  can  get  a  friend  to 
stand  by  and  keep  them  awake.  They  are  not  paid  for  think 
ing — they  are  not  paid  to  fret  about  the  world's  concerns. 
They  were  not  respectable  people — they  were  not  worthy 
people — they  were  not  learned  and  wise  and  brilliant  people — 
but  in  their  breasts,  all  their  stupid  lives  long,  resteth  a  peace 
that  passeth  understanding !  How  can  men,  calling  themselves 
men,  consent  to  be  so  degraded  and  happyT) 

We  whisked  by  many  a  gray  old  medieval  castle,  clad  thick 
with  ivy  that  swung  its  green  banners  down  from  towers  and 
turrets  where  once  some  old  Crusader's  flag  had  floated.  The 
driver  pointed  to  one  of  these  ancient  fortresses,  and  said  (I 
translate)  : 

"Do  you  see  that  great  iron  hook  that  projects  from  the  wall 
just  under  the  highest  window  in  the  ruined  tower?" 

We  said  we  could  not  see  it  at  such  a  distance,  but  had  no 
doubt  it  was  there. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "there  is  a  legend  connected  with  that  iron 
hook.  Nearly  seven  hundred  years  ago,  that  castle  was  the 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  139 

property  of  the  noble  Count  Luigi  Gennaro  Guido  Alphonso  di 
Genova — " 

"What  was  his  other  name?"  said  Dan. 

"He  had  no  other  name.  The  name  I  have  spoken  was  all 
the  name  he  had.  He  was  the  son  of — " 

"Poor  but  honest  parents — that  is  all  right —  never  mind 
the  particulars — go  on  with  the  legend." 

THE  LEGEND 

Well,  then,  all  the  world,  at  that  time,  was  in  a  wild  excite 
ment  about  the  Holy  Sepulcher.  All  the  great  feudal  lords  in 
Europe  were  pledging  their  lands  and  pawning  their  plate  to 
fit  out  men-at-arms  so  that  they  might  join  the  grand  armies 
of  Christendom  and  win  renown  in  the  Holy  Wars.  The 
Count  Luigi  raised  money,  like  the  rest,  and  one  mild  Sep 
tember  morning,  armed  with  battle-ax,  portcullis  and  thunder 
ing  culverin,  he  rode  through  the  greaves  and  bucklers  of  his 
donjon-keep  with  as  gallant  a  troop  of  Christian  bandits  as 
ever  stepped  in  Italy.  He  had  his  sword,  Excalibur,  with  him. 
His  beautiful  countess  and  her  young  daughter  waved  him  a 
tearful  adieu  from  the  battering-rams  and  buttresses  of  the 
fortress,  and  he  galloped  away  with  a  happy  heart. 

He  made  a  raid  on  a  neighboring  baron  and  completed  his 
outfit  with  the  booty  secured.  He  then  razed  the  castle  to 
the  ground,  massacred  the  family,  and  moved  on.  They  were 
hardy  fellows  in  the  grand  old  days  of  chivalry.  Alas !  those 
days  will  never  come  again. 

Count  Luigi  grew  high  in  fame  in  Holy  Land.  He  plunged 
into  the  carnage  of  a  hundred  battles,  but  his  good  Excalibur 
always  brought  him  out  alive,  albeit  often  sorely  wounded. 
His  face  became  browned  by  exposure  to  the  Syrian  sun  in 
long  marches;  he  suffered  hunger  and  thirst;  he  pined  in 
prisons,  he  languished  in  loathsome  plague-hospitals.  And 
many  and  many  a  time  he  thought  of  his  loved  ones  at  home, 
and  wondered  if  all  was  well  with  them.  But  his  heart  said, 
Peace,  is  not  thy  brother  watching  over  thy  household? 

Forty-two  years  waxed  and  waned ;  the  good  fight  was  won ; 
Godfrey  reigned  in  Jerusalem — the  Christian  hosts  reared  the 
banner  of  the  cross  above  the  Holy  Sepulcher ! 

Twilight  was  approaching.  Fifty  harlequins,  in  flowing 
robes,  approached  this  castle  wearily,  for  they  were  on  foot, 


140  MARK  TWAIN 

and  the  dust  upon  their  garments  betokened  that  they  had 
traveled  far.  They  overtook  a  peasant,  and  asked  him  if  it 
were  likely  they  could  get  food  and  a  hospital  bed  there,  for 
love  of  Christian  charity,  and  if,  perchance,  a  moral  parlor  en 
tertainment  might  meet  with  generous  countenance — "for," 
said  they,  'this  exhibition  hath  no  feature  that  could  offend 
the  most  fastidious  taste." 

"Marry,"  quoth  the  peasant,  "an  it  please  your  worships,  ye 
had  better  journey  many  a  good  rood  hence  with  your  juggling 
circus  than  trust  your  bones  in  yonder  castle." 

"How  now,  sirrah!"  exclaimed  the  chief  monk,  "explain 
thy  ribald  speech,  or  by'r  Lady  it  shall  go  hard  with  thee." 

"Peace,  good  mountebank,  I  did  but  utter  the  truth  that 
was  in  my  heart.  San  Paolo  be  my  witness  that  did  ye  but 
find  the  stout  Count  Leonardo  in  his  cups,  sheer  from  the 
castle's  topmost  battlements  would  he  hurl  ye  all!  Alack-a- 
day!  the  good  Lord  Luigi  reins  not  here  in  these  sad  times." 

"The  good  Lord  Luigi?" 

"Aye,  none  other,  please  your  worship.  In  his  day,  the 
poor  rejoiced  in  plenty  and  the  rich  he  did  oppress;  taxes 
were  not  known,  the  fathers  of  the  church  waxed  fat  upon 
his  bounty;  travelers  went  and  came,  with  none  to  inter t ere; 
and  whosoever  would,  might  tarry  in  his  halls  in  cordial  wel 
come,  and  eat  his  bread  and  drink  his  wine,  withal.  But  woe 
is  me !  some  two  and  forty  years  agone  the  good  count  rode 
hence  to  fight  for  Holy  Cross,  and  many  a  year  hath  flown 
since  word  or  token  have  we  had  of  him.  Men  say  his  bones 
lie  bleaching  in  the  fields  of  Palestine." 

"And  now  ?" 

"Now!"  God  'a  mercy,  the  cruel  Leonardo  lords  it  in  the 
castle.  He  wrings  taxes  from  the  poor ;  he  robs  all  travelers 
that  journey  by  his  gates;  he  spends  his  days  in  feuds  and 
murders,  and  his  nights  in  revel  and  debauch;  he  roasts  the 
fathers  of  the  church  upon  his  kitchen  spits,  and  enjoyeth  the 
same,  calling  it  pastime.  These  thirty  years  Luigi's  countess 
hath  not  been  seen  by  any  he  in  all  this  land,  and  many  whis 
per  that  she  pines  in  the  dungeons  of  the  castle  for  that  she 
will  not  wed  with  Leonardo,  saying  her  dear  lord  still  liveth 
and  that  she  will  die  ere  she  prove  false  to  him.  The  whis 
per  likewise  that  her  daughter  is  a  prisoner  as  well.  Nay,  good 
jugglers,  seek  ye  refreshment  otherwheres.  'Twere*  better 
that  ye  perished  in  a  Christian  way  than  that  ye  plunged  from 
off  yon  dizzy  tower.  Give  you  good  day.' 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  141 

"God  keep  ye,  gentle  knave — farewell." 

But  heedless  of  the  peasant's  warning,  the  players  moved 
straightway  toward  the  castle. 

Word  was  brought  to  Count  Leonardo  that  a  company  of 
mountebanks  besought  his  hospitality. 

'  Tis  well.  Dispose  of  them  in  the  customary  manner. 
Yet  stay !  I  have  need  of  them.  Let  them  come  hither.  Later, 
cast  them  from  the  battlements — or — how  many  priests  have 
ye  on  hand  ?" 

"The  day's  results  are  meager,  good  my  lord.  An  abbot 
and  a  dozen  beggarly  friars  is  all  we  have." 

"Hell  and  furies !  Is  the  estate  going  to  seed  ?  Send  hither 
the  mountebanks.  Afterward,  broil  them  with  the  priests." 

The  robed  and  close-cowled  harlequins  entered.  The  grim 
Leonardo  sate  in  state  at  the  head  of  his  council-board.  Ranged 
up  and  down  the  hall  on  either  hand  stood  near  a  hundred 
men-at-arms. 

"Ha,  villains!"  quoth  the  count,  "What  can  ye  do  to  earn 
the  hospitality  ye  crave?" 

"Dread  lord  and  mighty,  crowded  audiences  have  greeted 
our  humble  efforts  with  rapturous  applause.  Among  our  body 
count  we  the  versatile  and  talented  Ugolino;  the  justly  cele 
brated  Rodolpho ;  the  gifted  and  accomplished  Roderigo ;  the 
management  have  spared  neither  pains  nor  expense — " 

"S'death!  what  can  ye  do?     Curb  thy  prating  tongue." 

"Good  my  lord,  in  acrobatic  feats,  in  practice  with  the  dumb 
bells,  in  balancing  and  ground  and  lofty  tumblings  are  we 
versed — and  sith  your  highness  asketh  me,  I  venture  here  to 
publish  that  in  the  truly  marvelous  and  entertaining  Zampil- 
laerostation — " 

"Gag  him  !  throttle  him !  Body  of  Bacchus !  am  I  a  dog  that 
I  am  to  be  assailed  with  polysyllabled  blasphemy  like  to  this? 
But  hold !  Lucretia,  Isabel,  stand  forth !  Sirrah,  behold  this 
dame,  this  weeping  wench.  The  first  I  marry,  within  the  hour ; 
the  other  shall  dry  her  tears  or  feed  the  vultures.  Thou  and 
thy  vagabonds  shall  crown  the  wedding  with  thy  merrymak 
ings.  Fetch  hither  the  priest !" 

The  dame  sprang  toward  the  chief  player. 

"Oh,  save  me !"  she  cried ;  "save  me  from  a  fate  far  worse 
than  death!  Behold  these  sad  eyes,  these  sunken  cheeks,  this 
withered  frame!  See  thou  the  wreck  this  fiend  hath  made, 
and  let  thy  heart  be  moved  with  pity !  Look  upon  this  damosel ; 
note  her  wasted  form,  her  halting  step,  her  bloomless  cheeks 


142  MARK  TWAIN 

where  youth  should  blush  and  happiness  exult  in  smiles !  Hear 
us,  and  have  compassion.  This  monster  was  my  husband's 
brother.  He  who  should  have  been  our  shield  against  all 
harm,  hath  kept  us  shut  within  the  noisome  caverns  of  his 
donjon-keep  for,  lo,  these  thirty  years.  And  for  what  crime? 
None  other  than  that  I  would  not  belie  my  troth,  root  out  my 
strong  love  for  him  who  marches  with  the  legions  of  the  cross 
in  Holy  Land  (for  oh,  he  is  not  dead),  and  wed  with  him! 
Save  us,  oh,  save  thy  persecuted  suppliants !" 

She  flung  herself  at  his  feet  and  clasped  his  knees. 

"Ha!  ha!  ha!"  shouted  the  brutal  Leonardo.  "Priest,  to 
thy  work !"  and  he  dragged  the  weeping  dame  from  her  refuge. 
"Say,  once  for  all,  will  you  be  mine? — for  by  my  haiidome, 
that  breath  that  uttereth  thy  refusal  shall  be  thy  last  on 
earth !" 

"NE-VER!" 

"Then  die !"  and  the  sword  leaped  from  its  scabbard. 

Quicker  than  thought,  quicker  than  the  lightning's  flash, 
fifty  monkish  habits  disappeared,  and  fifty  knights  in  splendid 
armor  stood  revealed !  fifty  falchions  gleamed  in  air  above  the 
men-at-arms,  and  brighter,  fiercer  than  them  all,  flamed  Ex- 
calibur  aloft,  and  cleaving  downward  struck  the  brutal  Leo 
nardo's  weapon  from  his  grasp! 

"A  Luigi  to  the  rescue!    Whoop!" 

"A  Leonardo!  tare  an  ouns!" 

"Oh,  God,  oh,  God,  my  husband!" 

"Oh,  God,  oh,  God,  my  wife !" 

"My  father!" 

"My  precious !"     [Tableau.] 

Count  Luigi  bound  his  usurping  brother  hand  and  foot.  The 
practised  knights  from  Palestine  made  holiday  sport  of  carv 
ing  the  awkward  men-at-arms  into  chops  and  steaks.  The 
victory  was  complete.  Happiness  reigned.  The  knights  all 
married  the  daughter.  Joy !  wassail !  finis ! 

"But  what  did  they  do  with  the  wicked  brother?" 

"Oh,  nothing — only  hanged  him  on  that  iron  hook  I  was 
speaking  of.  By  the  chin." 

"As  how?" 

"Passed  it  up  through  his  gills  into  his  mouth." 

"Leave  him  there?" 

"Couple  of  years." 

"Ah— is— is  he  dead?" 

"Six  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  or  such  a  matter/' 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  143 

"Splendid  legend — splendid  lie — drive  on." 

We  reached  the  quaint  old  fortified  city  of  Bergamo,  the 
renowned  in  history,  some  three-quarters  of  an  hour  before 
the  train  was  ready  to  start.  The  place  has  thirty  or  forty 
thousand  inhabitants  and  is  remarkable  for  being  the  birth 
place  of  harlequin.  When  we  discovered  that,  that  legend  of 
our  driver  took  to  itself  a  new  interest  in  our  eyes. 

Rested  and  refreshed,  we  took  the  rail  happy  and  contented. 
I  shall  not  tarry  to  speak  of  the  handsome  Lago  di  Garda ;  its 
stately  castle  that  holds  in  its  stony  bosom  the  secrets  of  an 
age  so  remote  that  even  tradition  goeth  not  back  to  it ;  the  im 
posing  mountain  scenery  that  ennobles  the  landscape  there 
abouts  ;  nor  yet  of  ancient  Padua  or  haughty  Verona ;  nor  of 
their  Montagues  and  Capulets,  their  famous  balconies  and 
tombs  of  Juliet  and  Romeo  ct  al.,  but  hurry  straight  to  the  an 
cient  city  of  the  sea,  the  widowed  bride  of  the  Adriatic.  It 
was  a  long,  long  ride.  But  toward  evening,  as  we  sat  silent 
and  hardly  conscious  of  where  we  were — subdued  into  that 
meditative  calm  that  comes  so  surely  after  a  conversational 
storm — some  one  shouted: 
.  "VENICE!" 

And  sure  enough,  afloat  on  the  placid  sea  a  league  away,  lay 
a  great  city,  with  its  towers  and  domes  and  steeples  drowsing 
in  a  golden  mist  of  sunset. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

THIS  Venice,  which  was  a  haughty,  invincible,  magnifi 
cent  Republic  for  nearly  fourteen  hundred  years; 
whose  armies  compelled  the  world's  applause  whenever 
and  wherever  they  battled ;  whose  navy  well  nigh  held  dominion 
of  the  seas,  and  whose  merchant  fleets  whitened  the  remotest 
oceans  with  their  sails  and  loaded  these  piers  with  the  products 
of  every  clime,  is  fallen  a  prey  to  poverty,  neglect  and  melan 
choly  decay.  Six  hundred  years  ago,  Venice  was  the  Autocrat 
of  Commerce;  her  mart  was  the  great  commercial  center,  the 
distributing-house  from  whence  the  enormous  trade  of  the 
Orient  was  spread  aboard  over  the  Western  world.  To-day  her 
piers  are  deserted.  Her  warehouses  are  empty,  her  merchant 
fleets  are  vanished,  her  armies  and  navies  are  but  memories.  Her 
glouy  is  departed,  and  with  her  crumbling  grandeur  of  wharves 
and  palaces  about  her  she  sits  among  her  stagnant  lagoons,  for 
lorn  and  beggared,  forgotten  of  the  world.  She,  that  in  her 
palmy  days  commanded  the  commerce  of  a  hemisphere  and 
made  the  weal  or  woe  of  nations  with  a  beck  of  her  puissant 
finger,  is  become  the  humblest  among  the  peoples  of  the  earth, 
— a  peddler  of  glass  beads  for  women,  and  trifling  toys  and 
trinkets  for  school-girls  and  children. 

The  venerable  Mother  of  the  Republics  is  scarce  a  fit  subject 
for  flippant  speech  or  the  idle  gossiping  of  tourists.  It  seems 
a  sort  of  sacrilege  to  disturb  the  glamour  of  old  romances  that 
pictures  her  to  us  softly  from  afar  off  as  through  a  tinted  mist, 
and  curtain  her  ruins  and  her  desolation  from  our  view.  One 
aught,  indeed,  to  turn  away  from  her  rags,  her  poverty,  and  her 
humiliation,  and  think  of  her  only  as  she  was  when  she  sunk 
the  fleets  of  Charlemagne;  when  she  humbled  Frederick 
Barbarossa  or  waved  her  victorious  banners  above  the  battle 
ments  of  Constantinople. 

We  reached  Venice  at  eight  in  the  evening,  and  entered  a 
hearse  belonging  to  the  Grand  Hotel  d'Europe.  At  any  rate, 
it  was  more  like  a  hearse-  than  anything  else,  though,  to  speak 
by  the  card,  it  was  a  gondola.  And  this  was  the  storied  gondola 
of  Venice! — the  fairy  boat  in  which  the  princely  cavaliers  of 

144 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  145 

the  olden  times  were  wont  to  cleave  the  waters  of  the  moonlit 
canals  and  look  the  eloquence  of  love  into  the  soft  eyes  of  patri 
cian  beauties,  while  the  gay  gondoliers  in  silken  doublet  touched 
his  guitar  and  sang  as  only  gondoliers  can  sing !  This  the  famed 
gondola  and  this  the  gorgeous  gondolier ! — the  one  an  inky, 
rusty  old  canoe  with  a  sable  hearse-body  clapped  on  to  the  mid 
dle  of  it,  and  the  other  a  mangy,  barefooted  gutter-snipe  with 
a  portion  of  his  raiment  on  exhibition  which  should  have  been 
sacred  from  public  scrutiny.  Presently,  as  he  turned  a  corner 
and  shot  his  hearse  into  a  dismal  ditch  between  two  long  rows 
of  towering,  untenanted  buildings,  the  gay  gondolier  began  to 
sing,  true  to  the  traditions  of  his  race.  I  stood  it  a  little  while. 
Then  I  said: 

"Now,  here,  Roderigo  Gonzales  Michael  Angelo,  I'm  a 
pilgrim,  and  I'm  a  stranger,  but  I  am  not  going  to  have  my 
feelings  lacerated  by  any  such  caterwauling  as  that.  If  that 
goes  on,  one  of  us  has  got  to  take  water.  It  is  enough  that  my 
cherished  dreams  of  Venice  have  been  blighted  forever  as  to  the 
romantic  gondola  and  the  gorgeous  gondolier;  this  system  of 
destruction  shall  go  no  farther;  I  will  accept  the  hearse, 
under  protest,  and  you  may  fly  your  flag  of  truce  in  peace,  but 
here  I  register  a  dark  and  bloody  oath  that  you  sha'n't  sing. 
Another  yelp,  and  over  board  you  go." 

I  began  to  feel  that  the  old  Venice  of  song  and  story  had 
departed  forever.  But  I  was  too  hasty.  In  a  few  minutes 
we  swept  gracefully  out  into  the  Grand  Canal,  and  under  the 
mellow  moonlight  the  Venice  of  poetry  and  romance  stood  re 
vealed.  Right  from  the  water's  edge  rose  long  lines  of  stately 
palaces  of  marble;  gondolas  were  gliding  swiftly  hither  and 
thither  and  disappearing  suddenly  through  unsuspected  gates 
and  alleys;  ponderous  stone  bridges  threw  their  shadows 
athwart  the  glittering  waves.  There  was  life  and  motion 
everywhere,  and  yet  everywhere  there  was  a  hush,  a  stealthy 
sort  of  stillness,  that  was  suggestive  of  secret  enterprises  of 
bravoes  and  of  lovers ;  and,  clad  half  in  moonbeams  and  half 
in  mysterious  shadows,  the  grim  ofd  mansions  of  the  Republic 
seemed  to  have  an  expression  about  them  of  having  an  eye 
out  for  just  such  enterprises  as  these  at  that  same  moment. 
Music  came  floating  over  the  waters — Venice  was  complete. 

It  was  a  beautiful  picture — very  soft  and  dreamy  and  beauti 
ful.  But  what  was  this  Venice  to  compare  with  the  Venice  of 
midnight  ?  Nothing.  There  was  a  fete —  a  grand  fete  in  honor 
of  some  saint  who  had  been  instrumental  in  checking 


146  MARK  TWAIN 

the  cholera  three  hundred  years  ago,  and  all  Venice  was  aboard 
on  the  water.  It  was  no  common  affair,  for  the  Vene 
tians  did  not  know  how  soon  they  might  need  the  saint's  ser 
vices  again,  now  that  the  cholera  was  spreading  everywhere. 
So  in  one  vast  space — say  a  third  of  a  mile  wide  and  two  miles 
long —  were  collected  two  thousand  gondolas,  and  every  one  of 
them  had  from  two  to  ten,  twenty,  and  even  thirty  colored 
lanterns  suspended  about  it,  and  from  four  to  a  dozen  occupants. 
Just  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach,  these  painted  lights  were 
massed  together — like  a  vast  garden  of  many-colored  flowers 
except  that  these  blossoms  were  never  still;  they  were  cease 
lessly  gliding  in  and  out,  and  mingling  together,  and  seducing 
you  into  the  bewildering  attempts  to  follow  their  evolutions. 
Here  and  there  a  strong  red,  green,  or  blue  glare  from  a  rocket 
that  was  struggling  to  get  away  splendidly  illuminated  all  the 
boats  around  it.  Every  gondola  that  swam  by  us,  with  its 
crescents  and  pyramids  and  circles  of  colored  lamps  hung  aloft, 
and  lighting  up  the  faces  of  the  young  and  the  sweet-scented 
and  lovely  below,  was  a  picture;  and  the  reflections  of  those 
lights,  so  long,  so  slender,  so  numberless,  so  man-colored  and 
so  distorted  and  wrinkled  by  the  waves,  was  a  picture  like 
wise,  and  one  that  was  enchantingly  beautiful.  Many  and  many 
a  party  of  young  ladies  and  gentlemen  had  their  state  gondolas 
handsomely  decorated,  and  ate  supper  on  board,  bringing  their 
swallow-tailed,  white-cravatted  varlets  to  wait  upon  them, 
and  having  their  tables  tricked  out  as  if  for  a  bridal  supper. 
They  had  brought  along  the  costly  globe  lamps  from  their 
drawing-rooms,  and  the  lace  and  silken  curtains  from  the  same 
places,  I  suppose.  And  they  had  also  brought  pianos  ancl 
guitars,  and  they  played  and  sang  operas,  while  the  plebeian 
paper-lanterned  gondolas  from  the  suburbs  and  the  back  alleys 
crowded  around  to  stare  and  listen. 

There  was  music  everywhere —  choruses,  string-bands,  brass- 
bands,  flutes,  everything.  I  was  so  surrounded,  walled  in  with 
music,  magnificence,  and  loveliness,  that  I  became  inspired 
with  the  spirit  of  the  scene,  and  sang  one  tune  myself.  How 
ever,  when  I  observed  that  the  other  gondolas  had'  sailed  away, 
and  my  gondolier  was  preparing  to  go  over-board,  I  stopped. 

The  fete  was  magnificent.  They  kept  it  up  the  whole  night 
long,  and  I  never  enjoyed  myself  better  than  I  did  while  it 
lasted. 

What  a  funny  old  city  this  Queen  of  the  Adriatic  is !  Nar 
row  streets,  vast,  gloomy  marble  palaces,  black  with  the  cor- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  147 

reeling  damps  of  centuries,  and  all  partly  submerged ;  no  dry 
land  visible  anywhere,  and  no  sidewalks  worth  mentioning; 
if  you  want  to  go  to  church,  to  the  theater,  or  to  the  restaurant, 
you  must  call  a  gondola.  It  must  be  a  paradise  for  cripples, 
for  verily  a  man  has  no  use  for  legs  here. 

For  a  day  or  two  the  place  looked  so  like  an  overflowed 
Arkansas  town,  because  of  its  currentless  waters  laving  the 
very  doorsteps  of  all  the  houses,  and  the  cluster  of  boats  made 
fast  under  the  windows,  or  skimming  in  and  out  of  the  alleys 
and  byways,  that  I  could  not  get  rid  of  the  impression  that 
there  was  nothing  the  matter  here  but  a  spring  freshet,  and  that 
the  river  would  fall  in  a  few  weeks  and  leave  a  dirty  high-water 
mark  on  the  houses,  and  the  streets  full  of  mud  and  rubbish. 

In  the  glare  of  day,  there  is  little  poetry  about  Venice,  but 
under  the  charitable  moon  her  stained  palaces  are  white  again, 
their  battered  sculptures  are  hidden  in  shadows,  and  the  old 
city  seems  crowned  once  more  with  the  grandeur  that  was 
hers  five  hundred  years. ago.  It  is  easy,  then,  in  fancy,  to 
people  these  silent  canals  with  plumed  gallants  and  fair  ladies 
—with  Shylocks  in  gaberdine  and  sandals,  venturing  loans 
upon  the  rich  argosies  of  Venetian  commerce — with  Othellos 
and  Desdemonas,  with  lagos  and  Roderigos — with  noble 
fleets  and  victorious  legions  returning  from  the  wars.  In  the 
treacherous  sunlight  we  see  Venice  decayed,  forlorn,  poverty- 
stricken,  and  commerceless — forgotten  and  utterly  insignifi 
cant.  But  in  the  moonlight,  her  fourteen  centuries  of  great 
ness  fling  their  glories  about  her,  and  once  more  is  she  the 
princeliest  among  the  nations  of  the  earth. 

There  is  a  glorious  city  in  the  sea ; 

The  sea  is   in  the  broad,  the  narrow  streets, 

Ebbing  and  flowing;  and  the  salt  seaweed 

Clings  to  the  marble  of  her  palaces. 

No  track  of  men,  no  footsteps  to  and  fro, 

Lead  to  her  gates !     The  path  lies  o'er  the  sea, 

Invisible;  and  from  the  land  we  went, 

As  to  a  floating  city — steering  in, 

And  gliding  up  her   streets,  as   in  a  dream, 

So  smoothly,  silently — by  many  a  dome, 

Mosque-like,  and  many  a  stately  portico, 

The  statues  ranged  along  an  azure  sky; 

By  many  a  pile,  in  more  than  Eastern  pride, 

Of   old  the   residence  of   merchant   kings; 


148  MARK  TWAIN 

The  fronts  of  some,  tho'  time  had  shattered  them, 
Still  glowing  with  the  richest  hues  of  art, 
As  tho'  the  wealth  within  them  had  run  o'er. 

What  would  one  naturally  wish  to  see  first  in  Venice?  The 
Bridge  of  Sighs,  of  course — and  next  the  Church  and  the  Great 
Square  of  St.  Mark,  the  Bronze  Horses,  and  the  famous  Lion 
of  St.  Mark. 

We  intended  to  go  to  the  Bridge  of  Sighs,  but  happened  into 
the  Ducal  Palace  first — a  building  which  necessarily  figures 
largely  in  Venetian  poetry  and  tradition.  In  the  Senate 
Chamber  of  the  ancient  Republic  we  wearied  our  eyes  with 
staring  at  acres  of  historical  paintings  by  Tintoretto  and  Paul 
Veronese,  but  nothing  struck  us  forcibly  except  the  one  thing 
that  strikes  all  strangers  forcibly — a  black  square  in  the 
midst  of  a  gallery  of  portraits.  In  one  long  row,  around  the 
great  hall,  were  painted  the  portraits  of  the  doges  of  Venice 
(venerable  fellows,  with  flowing  white  beards,  for  of  the  three 
hundred  Senators  eligible  to  the  office,  the  oldest  was  usually 
chosen  doge),  and  each  had  its  complimentary  inscription  at 
tached — till  you  came  to  the  place  that  should  have  had  Marino 
Faliero's  picture  in  it,  and  that  was  blank  and  black — blank,  ex 
cept  that  it  bore  a  terse  inscription,  saying  that'  the  conspirator 
had  died  for  his  crimes.  It  seemed  cruel  to  keep  that  pitiless 
inscription  still  staring  from  the  walls  after  the  unhappy  wretch 
had  been  in  his  grave  five  hundred  years. 

At  the  head  of  the  Giant's  Staircase,  where  Marino  Faliero 
was  beheaded,  and  where  the  doges  were  crowned  in  ancient 
times,  two  small  slits  in  the  stone  wall  were  pointed  out — two 
harmless,  insignificant  orifices  that  would  never  attract  a 
stranger's  attention — yet  these  were  the  terrible  Lions' 
Mouths !  The  heads  were  gone  (knocked  off  by  the  French* 
during  their  occupation  of  Venice),  but  these  were  the  throats, 
down  which  went  the  anonymous  accusation,  thrust  in  secretly 
at  dead  of  night  by  an  enemy,  that  doomed  many  an  innocent 
man  to  walk  the  Bridge  of  Sighs  and  descend  into  the  dungeon 
which  none  entered  and  hoped  to  see  the  sun  again.  This  was 
in  the  old  days  when  the  Patricians  alone  governed  Venice— 
the  common  herd  had  no  vote  and  no  voice.  There  were  one 
thousand  five  hundred  Patricians ;  from  these,  three  hundred 
Senators  were  chosen ;  from  the  Senators  a  Doge  and  a  Coun 
cil  of  Ten  were  selected,  and  by  secret  ballot  the  Ten  chose 
from  their  own  number  a  Council  of  Three.  All  these  were 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  149 

government  spies,  then,  and  every  spy  was  under  surveillance 
himself — men  spoke  in  whispers  in  Venice,  and  no  man  trusted 
his  neighbor — not  always  his  own  brother.  No  man  knew 
who  the  Council  of  Three  were — not  even  the  Senate,  not  even 
the  Doge;  the  members  of  that  dread  tribunal  met  at  night 
in  a  chamber  to  themselves,  masked,  and  robed  from  head  to 
foot  in  scarlet  cloaks,  and  did  not  even  know  each  other,  un 
less  by  voice.  It  was  their  duty  to  judge  heinous  political 
crimes,  and  from  their  sentence  there  was  no  appeal.  A  nod 
to  the  executioner  was  sufficient.  The  doomed  man  was 
marched  down  a  hall  and  out  at  a  doorway  into  the  covered 
Bridge  of  Sighs,  through  it  and  into  the  dungeon  and  unto 
his  death.  At  no  time  in  his  transit  was  he  visible  to  any  save 
his  conductor.  If  a  man  had  an  enemy  in  those  old  days,  the 
cleverest  thing  he  could  do  was  to  slip  a  note  for  the  Council 
of  Three  into  the  Lion's  mouth,  saying  "This  man  is  plotting 
against  the  government."  If  the  awful  Three  found  no  proof, 
ten  to  one  they  would  drown  him  anyhow,  because  he  was  a 
deep  rascal,  since  his  plots  were  unsolvable.  Masked  judges 
and  masked  executioners,  with  unlimited  power,  and  no  appeal 
from  their  judgments,  in  that  hard,  cruel  age,  were  not  likely 
to  be  lenient  with  men  they  suspected  yet  could  not  convict. 

We  walked  through  the  hall  of  the  Council  of  Ten,  and 
presently  entered  the  infernal  den  of  the  Council  of  Three. 

The  table  around  which  they  had  sat  was  there  still,  and 
likewise  the  stations  where  the  masked  inquisitors  and  execu 
tioners  formerly  s"tood,  frozen,  upright  and  silent,  till  they 
received  a  bloody  order,  and  then,  without  a  word,  moved  off, 
like  the  inexorable  machines  they  were,  to  carry  it  out.  The 
frescoes  on  the  walls  were  startlingly  suited  to  the  place.  In 
all  the  other  salons,  the  halls,  the  great  state  chambers  of  the 
palace,  the  walls  and  ceilings  were  bright  with  gilding,  rich  with 
elaborate  carving,  and  resplendent  with  gallant  pictures  of  Vene 
tian  victories  in  war,  and  Venetian  display  in  foreign  courts, 
and  hallowed  with  portraits  of  the  Virgin,  the  Saviour  of  men, 
and  the  holy  saints  that  preached  the  Gospel  of  Peace  upon 
earth — but  here,  in  dismal  contrast,  were  none  but  pictures  of 
death  and  dreadful  suffering! — not  a  living  figure  but  was 
writhing  in  torture,  not  a  dead  one  but  was  smeared  with  blood, 
gashed  with  wounds,  and  distorted  with  the  agonies  that  had 
taken  away  its  life ! 

From  the  palace  to  the  gloomy  prison  is  but  a  step — one 
might  almost  jump  across  the  narrow  canal  that  intervenes. 


150  MARK  TWAIN 

The  ponderous  stone  Bridge  of  Sighs  crosses  it  at  the  second 
story — a  bridge  that  is  a  covered  tunnel — you  cannot  be  seen 
when  you  walk  in  it.  It  is  partitioned  lengthwise,  and  through 
one  compartment  walked  such  as  bore  light  sentences  in  ancient 
times,  and  through  the  other  marched  sadly  the  wretches  whom 
the  Three  had  doomed  to  lingering  misery  and  utter  oblivion 
in  the  dungeons,  or  to  sudden  and  mysterious  death.  Down 
below  the  level  of  the  water,  by  the  light  of  smoking  torches, 
we  were  shown  the  damp,  thick-walled  cells  where  many  a  proud 
patrician's  life  was  eaten  away  by  the  long-drawn  miseries  of 
solitary  imprisonment — without  light,  air,  books ;  naked,  un 
shaven,  uncombed,  covered  with  vermin ;  his  useless  tongue 
forgetting  its  office,  with  none  to  speak  to ;  the  days  and  nights 
of  his  life  no  longer  marked,  but  merged  into  one  eternal  event 
less  night ;  far  away  from  all  cheerful  sounds,  buried  in  the  si 
lence  of  a  tomb ;  forgotten  by  his  helpless  friends,  and  his  fate  a 
dark  mystery  to  them  forever ;  losing  his  own  memory  at  last, 
and  knowing  no  more  who  he  was  or  how  he  came  there ; 
devouring  the  loaf  of  bread  and  drinking  the  water  that  were 
thrust  into  the  cell  by  unseen  hands,  and  troubling  his  worn 
spirit  no  more  with  hopes  and  fears  and  doubts  and  longings 
to  be  free;  ceasing  to  scratch  vain  prayers  and  complainings 
on  walls  where  none,  not  even  himself,  could  see  them,  and  re 
signing  himself  to  hopeless  apathy,  driveling  childishness, 
lunacy!  Many  and  many  a  sorrowful  story  like  this  these 
stony  walls  could  tell  if  they  could  but  speak. 

In  a  little  narrow  corridor,  near  by,  they  showed  us  where 
many  a  prisoner,  after  lying  in  the  dungeons  until  he  was  for 
gotten  by  all  save  his  persecutors,  was  brought  by  masked 
executioners  and  garroted,  or  sewed  up  in  a  sack,  passed 
through  a  little  window  to  a  boat,  at  dead  of  night,  and  taken 
to  some  remote  spot  and  drowned. 

They  used  to  show  to  visitors  the  implements  of  torture 
wherewith  the  Three  were  wont  to  worm  secrets  out  of  the 
accused — villainous  machines  for  crushing  thumbs ;  the  stocks 
where  a  prisoner  sat  immovable  while  water  fell  drop  by  drop 
upon  his  head  till  the  torture  was  more  than  humanity  could 
bear;  and  a  devilish  contrivance  of  steel,  which  inclosed  a 
prisoner's  head  like  a  shell,  and  crushed  it  slowly  by  means  of 
a  screw.  It  bore  the  stains  of  blood  that  had  trickled  through 
its  joints  long  ago,  and  on  one  side  it  had  a  projection  whereon 
the  torturer  rested  his  elbow  comfortably  and  bent  down  his 
ear  to  catch  the  meanings  of  the  sufferer  perishing  within. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  151 

Of  course,  we  went  to  see  the  venerable  relic  of  the  ancient 
glory  of  Venice,  with  its  pavements  worn  and  broken  by  the 
passing  feet  of  a  thousand  years  of  plebeians  and  patricians 
-The  Cathedral  of  St.  Mark.  It  is  built  entirely  of  precious 
marbles,  brought  from  the  Orient — nothing  in  its  composition 
is  domestic.  Its  hoary  traditions  make  it  an  object  of  absorb 
ing  interest  to  even  the  most  careless  stranger,  and  thus  far 
it  had  interest  for  me;  but  no  further.  I  could  not  go  into 
ecstasies  over  its  coarse  mosaics,  its  unlovely  Byzantine  archi 
tecture,  or  its  five  hundred  curious  interior  columns  from  as 
many  distant  quarries.  Everything  was  worn  out — every 
block  of  stone  was  smooth  and  almost  shapeless  with  the 
polishing  hands  and  shoulders  of  loungers  who  devoutly  idled 
here  in  bygone  centuries  and  have  died  and  gone  to  the  dev- 
no,  simply  died,  I  mean. 

Under  the  altar  repose  the  ashes  of  St.  Mark — and  Mat 
thew,  Luke,  and  John,  too,  for  all  I  know..  Venice  reveres 
those  relics  above  all  things  earthly.  For  fourteen  hundred 
years  St.  Mark  has  been  her  patron  saint.  Everything  about 
the  city  seems  to  be  named  after  him  or  so  named  as  to  refer 
to  him  in  some  way — so  named,  or  some  purchase  rigged  in 
some  way  to  scrape  a  sort  of  hurrahing  acquaintance  with  him. 
That  seems  to  be  the  idea.  To  be  on  good  terms  with  St.  Mark 
seems  to  be  the  very  summit  of  Venetian  ambition.  They  say 
St.  Mark  had  a  tame  lion,  and  used  to  travel  with  him — and 
everywhere  that  St.  Mark  went,  the  lion  was  sure  to  go.  It 
was  his  protector,  his  friend,  his  librarian.  And  so  the  Winged 
Lion  of  St.  Mark,  with  the  open  Bible  under  his  paw,  is  a 
favorite  emblem  in  the  grand  old  city.  It  casts  its  shadow 
from  the  most  ancient  pillar  in  Venice,  in  the  Grand  Square 
of  St.  Mark,  upon  the  throngs  of  free  citizens  below,  and  has 
so  done  for  many  a  long  century.  The  winged  lion  is  found 
everywhere — and  doubtless  here,  where  the  winged  lion  is,  no 
harm  can  come. 

St.  Mark  died  at  Alexandria,  in  Egypt.  He  was  martyred, 
I  think.  However,  that  has  nothing  to  do  with  my  legend. 
About  the  founding  of  the  city  of  Venice — say  four  hundred 
and  fifty  years  after  Christ  (for  Venice  is  much  younger 
than  any  other  Italian  city) — a  priest  dreamed  that  an  angel 
told  him  that  until  the  remains  of  St.  Mark  were  brought 
to  Venice,  the  city  could  never  rise  to  high  distinction  among 
the  nations;  that  the  body  must  be  captured,  brought  to  the 
city,  and  a  magnificent  church  built  over  it;  and  that  if  ever 


152  MARK  TWAIN 

the  Venetians  allowed  the  Saint  to  be  removed  frcftn  his  new 
resting-place,  in  that  day  Venice  would  perish  from  off  the 
face  of  the  earth.  The  priest  proclaimed  his  dream,  and  forth 
with  Venice  set  about  procuring  the  corpse  of  St.  Mark.  One 
expedition  after  another  tried  and  failed,  but  the  project  was 
never  abandoned  during  four  hundred  years.  At  last  it  was 
secured  by  strategem,  in  the  year  eight  hundred  and  some 
thing.  The  commander  of  a  Venetian  expedition  disguised 
himself,  stole  the  bones,  separated  them,  and  packed  them  in 
vessels  filled  with  lard.  The  religion  of  Mohammed  causes 
its  devotees  to  abhor  anything  that  is  in  the  nature  of  pork, 
and  so  when  the  Christian  was  stopped  by  the  officers  at  the 
gates  of  the  city,  they  only  glanced  once  into  his  precious 
baskets,  then  turned  up  their  noses  at  the  unholy  lard,  and 
let  him  go.  The  bones  were  buried  in  the  vaults  of  the  grand 
cathedral,  which  had  been  waiting  long  years  to  receive  them, 
and  thus  the  safety  and  the  greatness  of  Venice  were  secured. 
And  to  this  day  there  be  those  in  Venice  who  believe  that  if 
those  holy  ashes  were  stolen  away,  the  ancient  city  would 
vanish  like  a  dream,  and  its  foundations  be  buried  forever  in 
the  unremembering  sea. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

THE   Venetian  gondola   is   as   free   and   graceful,   in   its 
gliding   movement,    as    a    serpent.      It   is    twenty   pr 
thirty  feet  long,  and  is  narrow  and  deep,  like  a  canoe; 
its  sharp  bow  and  stern  sweep  upward  from  the  water  like  the 
horns  of  a  crescent  with  the  abruptness  of  the  curve  slightly 
modified. 

The  bow  is  ornamented  with  a  steel  comb  with  a  battle-ax 
tion  of  patrician  show  on  the  Grand  Canal,  and  required  a 
wholesome  snubbing.  Reverence  for  the  hallowed  Past  and 
its  traditions  keeps  the  dismal  fashion  in  force  now  that 
the  compulsion  exists  no  longer.  So  let  it  remain.  It  is  the 
color  of  mourning.  Venice  mourns.  The  stern  of  the  boat  is 
decked  over  and  the  gondolier  stands  there.  He  uses  a  single 
attachment  which  threatens  to  cut  passing  boats  in  two  oc 
casionally,  but  never  does.  The  gondola  is  painted  black  be 
cause  in  the  zenith  of  Venetian  magnificence  the  gondolas  be 
came  too  gorgeous  altogether,  and  the  Senate  decreed  that  all 
such  display  must  cease,  and  a  solemn,  unembellished  black 
be  substituted.  If  the  truth  were  known,  it  would  doubtless 
appear  that  rich  plebeians  grew  too  prominent  in  their  affecta- 
oar — a  long  blade,  of  course,  for  he  stands  nearly  erect.  A 
wooden  peg,  a  foot  and  a  half  high,  with  two  slight  crooks 
or  curves  in  one  side  of  it  and  one  in  the  other,  projects 
above  the  starboard  gunwale.  Against  that  peg  the  gondolier 
takes  a  purchase  with  his  oar,  changing  it  at  intervals  to  the 
other  side  of  the  peg  or  dropping  it  into  another  of  the  crooks, 
as  the  steering  of  the  craft  may  demand — and  how  in  the  world 
he  can  back  and  fill,  shoot  straight  ahead,  or  flirt  suddenly 
around  a  corner,  and  make  the  oar  stay  in  those  insignificant 
notches,  is  a  problem  to  me  and  a  never-diminishing  matter 
of  interest.  I  am  afraid  I  study  the  gondolier's  marvelous 
skill  more  than  I  do  the  sculptured  palaces  we  glide  among. 
He  cuts  a  corner  so  closely,  now  and  then,  or  misses  another 
gondola  by  such  an  imperceptible  hair-breadth,  that  I  feel  my 
self  "scrooching,"  as  the  children  say,  just  as  one  does  when 

1  jo 


154  MARK  TWAIN 

a  buggy-wheel  grazes  his  elbow.  But  he  makes  all  his  calcu 
lations  "with  the  nicest  precision,  and  goes  darting  in  and 
out  among  a  Broadway  confusion  of  busy  craft  with  the  easy 
confidence  of  the  educated  hackman.  He  never  makes  a 
mistake. 

Sometimes  we  go  flying  down  the  great  canals  at  such  a 
gait  that  we  can  get  only  the  merest  glimpses  into  front  doors, 
and  again,  in  obscure  alleys  in  the  suburbs,  we  put  on  a 
solemnity  suited  to  the  silence,  the  mildew,  the  stagnant  waters, 
the  clinging  weeds,  the  deserted  houses,  and  the  general  life- 
lessness  of  the  place,  and  move  to  the  spirit  of  grave  medita 
tion. 

The  gondolier  is  a  picturesque  rascal  for  all  he  wears  no 
satin  harness,  no  plumed  bonnet,  no  silken  tights.  His  atti 
tude  is  stately;  he  is  lithe  and  supple;  all  his  movements  are 
full  of  grace.  When  his  long  canoe,  and  his  fine  figure, 
towering  from  its  high  perch  on  the  stern,  are  cut  against  the 
evening  sky,  they  make  a  picture  that  is  very  novel  and  striking 
to  a  foreign  eye. 

We  sit  in  the  cushioned  carriage-body  of  a  cabin,  with  the 
curtains  drawn,  and  smoke,  or  read,  or  look  out  upon  the 
passing  boats,  the  houses,  the  bridges,  the  people,  and  enjoy 
ourselves  much  more  than  we  could  in  a  buggy  jolting  over  our 
cobblestone  pavements  at  home.  This  is  the  gentlest,  pleasant- 
est  locomotion  we  have  ever  known. 

But  it  seems  queer — ever  so  queer — to  see  a  boat  doing 
duty  as  a  private  carriage.  We  see  business  men  come  to 
the  front  door,  step  into  a  gondola,  instead  of  a  street-car,  and 
go  off  down-town  to  the  counting-room. 

We  see  visiting  young  ladies  stand  on  the  stoop,  and  laugh, 
and  kiss  good-by,  and  flirt  their  fans  and  say  "Come  soon — j 
now  do — you've'  been  just  as  mean  as  ever  you  can  be — 
mother's  dying  to  see  you — and  we've  moved  into  the  new 
house,  oh,  such  a  love  of  a  place ! — so  convenient  to  the  post- 
office  and  the  church,  and  the  Young  Men's  Christian  As 
sociation;  and  we  do  have  such  fishing,  and  such  carrying- 
on,  and  such  swimming-matches  in  the  back  yard — Oh,  you 
must  come — no  distance  at  all,  and  if  you  go  down  through  by 
St.  Mark's  and  the  Bridge  of  Sighs,  and  cut  through  the 
alley  and  come  up  by  the  church  of  Santa  Maria  dei  Frari,  and. 
into  the  Grand  Canal,  there  isn't  a  bit  of  current — now  do 
come,  Sally  Maria — by-by!"  and  then  the  little  humbug  trips 
down  the  steps,  jumps  into  the  gondola,  says,  under  her 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  155 

breath,  "Disagreeable  old  thing,  I  hope  she  won't!"  goes  skim 
ming-  away,  round  the  corner;  and  the  other  girl  slams  the 
street  door  and  says,  "Well,  that  infliction's  over,  anyway, — 
but  I  suppose  I've  got  to  go  and  see  her — tiresome,  stuck-up 
thing!"  Human  nature  appears  to  be  just  the  same,  all  over 
the  world.  We  see  the  diffident  young  man,  mild  of  mustache, 
affluent  of  hair,  indigent  of  brain,  elegant  of  costume,  drive  up 
to  her  father's  mansion,  tell  his  hackman  to  bail  out  and  wait, 
start  fearfully  up  the  steps  and  meet  "the  old  gentleman"  right 
on  the  threshold ! — hear  him  ask  what  street  the  new  British 
Bank  is  in — as  if  that  were  what  he  came  for — arid  then  bounce 
into  his  boat  and  scurry  away  with  his  coward  heart  in  his 
boots ! — see  him  come  sneaking  around  the  corner  again,  di 
rectly,  with  a  crack  of  the  curtain  open  toward  the  old  gentle 
man's  disappearing  gondola,  and  out  scampers  his  Susan  with 
a  flock  of  little  Italian  endearments  fluttering  from  her  lips, 
and  goes  to  drive  with  him  in  the  watery  avenues  down  toward 
the  Rialto. 

We  see  the  ladies  go  out  shopping,  in  the  most  natural 
way,  and  flit  from  street  to  street  and  from  store  to  store, 
-just  in  the  good  old  fashion,  except  that  they  leave  the  gondola, 
instead  of  a  private  carriage,  waiting  at  the  curbstone  a  couple 
of  hours  for  them, — waiting  while  they  make  the  nice  young 
clerks  pull  down  tons  and  tons  of  silks  and  velvets  and  moire 
antiques  and  those  things ;  and  then  they  buy  a  paper  of  pins 
and  go  paddling  away  to  confer  the  rest  of  their  disastrous 
patronage  on  some  other  firm.  And  they  always  have  their 
purchases  sent  home  just  in  the  good  old  way.  Human  nature 
is  very  much  the  same  all  over  the  world ;  and  it  is  so  like  my 
dear  native  home  to  see  a  Venetian  lady  go  into  a  store  and 
buy  ten  cents'  worth  of  blue  ribbon  and  have  it  sent  home  in 
a  scow.  Ah,  it  is  these  little  touches  of  nature  that  move  one 
to  tears  in  these  far-off  foreign  lands. 

Wre  see  little  girls  and  boys  go  out  in  gondolas  with  their 
nurses,  for  an  airing.  We  see  staid  families,  with  prayer-book 
and  beads,  enter  the  gondola  dressed  in  their  Sunday  best,  and 
float  away  to  church.  And  at  midnight  we  see  the  theater 
break  up  and  discharge  its  swarm  of  hilarious  youth  and 
beauty;  we  hear  the  cries  of  the  hackman-gondoliers,  and  be 
hold  the  struggling  crowd  jump  aboard,  and  the  black  multi 
tude  of  boats  go  skimming  down  the  moonlit  avenues ;  we  see 
them  separate  here  and  there,  and  disappear  up  divergent 
streets;  we  hear  the  faint  sounds  of  laughter  and  of  shouted 


156  MARK  TWAIN 

farewells  floating  up  out  of  the  distance ;  and  then,  the  strange 
pageant  being  gone,  we  have  lonely  stretches  of  glittering 
water — of  stately  buildings — of  blotting  shadows — of  weird 
stone  faces  creeping  into  the  moonlight — of  deserted  bridges — 
of  motionless  boats  at  anchor.  And  over  all  broods  that  mys 
terious  stillness,  that  stealthy  quiet,  that  befits  so  well  this 
old  dreaming  Venice. 

We  have  been  pretty  much  everywhere  in  our  gondola.  We 
have  bought  beads  and  photographs  in  the  stores,  and  wax 
matches  in  the  Great  Square  of  St.  Mark.  The  last  remark 
suggests  a  digression.  Everybody  goes  to  this  vast  square  in 
the  evening.  The  military  bands  play  in  the  center  of  it  and 
countless  couples  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  promenade  up  and 
down  on  either  side,  and  platoons  of  them  are  constantly 
drifting  away  toward  the  old  cathedral,  and  by  the  venerable 
column  with  the  Winged  Lion  of  St.  Mark  on  its  top,  and 
out  to  where  the  boats  lie  moored ;  and  other  platoons  are  as 
constantly  arriving  from  the  gondolas  and  joining  the  great 
throng.  Between  the  promenaders  and  the  sidewalks  are 
seated  hundreds  and  hundreds  of  people  at  small  tables,  smok 
ing  and  taking  granita  (a  first  cousin  to  ice-cream)  ;  on  the 
sidewalks  are  more  employing  themselves  in  the  same  way. 
The  shops  in  the  first  floor  of  the  tall  row  of  buildings 
that  wall  in  three  sides  of  the  square  are  brilliantly  lighted, 
the  air  is  filled  with  music  and  merry  voices,  and  altogether 
the  scene  is  as  bright  and  spirited  and  full  of  cheerfulness 
as  any  man  could  desire.  We  enjoy  it  thoroughly.  Very  many 
of  the  young  women  are  exceedingly  pretty  and  dress  with 
rare  good  taste.  We  are  gradually  and  laboriously  learning 
the  ill  manners  of  staring  them  unflinchingly  in  the  face — not 
because  such  conduct  is  agreeable  to  us,  but  because  it  is  the* 
custom  of  the  country  and  they  say  the  girls  like  it.  We  wish' 
to  learn  all  the  curious,  outlandish  ways  of  all  the  different 
countries,  so  that  we  can  "show  off"  and  astonish  people  when 
we  get  home.  We  wish  to  excite  the  envy  of  our  untraveled 
friends  with  our  strange  foreign  fashions  which  we  can't 
shake  off.  All  our  passengers  are  paying  strict  attention  to 
this  thing,  with  the  end  in  view  which  I  have  mentioned.  The 
gentle  reader  will  never,  never  know  what  a  consummate  ass 
he  can  become  until  he  goes  abroad.  I  speak  now,  of  course, 
in  the  supposition  that  the  gentle  reader  has  not  been  abroad, 
and  therefore  is  not  already  a  consummate  ass.  If  the  case 
be  otherwise,  I  beg  his  pardon  and  extend  to  him  the  cordial 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  157 

hand  of  fellowship  and  call  him  brother.  I  shall  always  de 
light  to  meet  an  ass  after  my  own  heart  when  I  shall  have 
finished  my  travels. 

On  this  subject  let  me  remark  that  there  are  Americans 
abroad  in  Italy  who  have  actually  forgotten  their  mother- 
tongue  in  three  months — forgot  it  in  France.  They  cannot 
even  write  their  address  in  English  in  a  hotel  register.  I 
append  these  evidences,  which  I  copied  verbatim  from  the 
register  of  a  hotel  in  a  certain  Italian  city. 

John  P.  Whitcomb,  Btats  Unis. 

William  L.  Ainsworth,  travaillcur  (he  meant  traveler,  I  suppose), 
£tats  Unis. 

George  P.  Morton  et  fils,  d' Amerique. 

Lloyd  B.  Williams,  et  trois  amis,  ville  de  Boston,  Amerique. 

].  Ellsworth  Baker,  tout  de  suite  de  France,  place  de  nalssance 
Amerique,  destination  la  Grande  Bretagne. 

I  love  this  sort  of  people.  A  lady  passenger  of  ours  tells  of 
a  fellow-citizen  of  hers  who  spent  eight  weeks  in  Paris  and 
then  returned  home  and  addressed  his  dearest  old  bosom  friend 
Herbert  as  Mr.  "Er-bare!"  He  apologized,  though,  and  said, 
'  'Pon  my  soul  it  is  aggravating,  but  I  cahn't  help  it — I  have  got 
so  used  to  speaking  nothing  but  French,  my  dear  Erbare — 
damme  there  it  goes  again ! — got  so  used  to  French  pronuncia 
tion  that  I  cahn't  get  rid  of  it — it  is  positively  annoying,  I 
assure  you."  This  enterprising  idiot,  whose  name  was 
Gordon,  allowed  himself  to  be  hailed  three  times  in  the  street 
before  he  paid  any  attention,  and  then  begged  a  thousand  par 
dons  and  said  he  had  grown  so  accustomed  to  hearing  himself 
addressed  as  "M'sieu  Gor-r-dong,"  with  a  roll  to  the  r,  that 
he  had  forgotten  the  legitimate  sound  of  his  name !  He  wore 
a  rose  in  his  buttonhole;  he  gave  the  French  salutation — two 
flips  of  the  hand  in  front  of  the  face;  he  called  Paris  Pairree 
in  ordinary  English  conversation;  he  carried  envelopes  bear 
ing  foreign  postmarks  protruding  from  his  breast  pocket;  he 
cultivated  a  mustache  and  imperial,  and  did  what  else  he  could 
to  suggest  to  the  beholder  his  pet  fancy  that  he  resembled 
Louis  Napoleon — and  in  a  spirit  of  thankfulness  which  is  en 
tirely  unaccountable,  considering  the  slim  foundation  there 
was  for  it,  he  praised  his  Maker  that  he  was  as  he  was,  and 
went  on  enjoying  his  little  life  just  the  same  as  if  he  really 
had  been  deliberately  designed  and  erected  by  the  great  Archi 
tect  of  the  Universe. 


158  MARK  TWAIN 

Think  of  our  Whitcombs  and  our  Ainsworths  and  our  Wil- 
liamses  writing  themselves  down  in  dilapidated  French  in  a  for 
eign  hotel-register !  We  laugh  at  Englishmen,  when  we  are  at 
home,  for  sticking  so  sturdily  to  their  national  ways  and 
customs,  but  we  look  back  upon  it  from  abroad  very  forgiv 
ingly.  It  is  not  pleasant  to  see  an  American  thrusting  his 
nationality  forward  obtrusively  in  a  foreign  land,  but  oh,  it 
is  pitiable  to  see  him  making  of  himself  a  thing  that  is  neither 
>  male  nor  female,  neither  fish,  flesh,  nor  fowl — a  poor,  mis 
erable,  hermaphrodite  Frenchman! 

Among  a  long  list  of  churches,  art-galleries,  and  such  things, 
visited  by  us  in  Venice,  I  shall  mention  only  one — the  Church 
of  Santa  Maria  dei  Frari.  It  is  about  five  hundred  years  old, 
I  believe,  and  stands  on  twelve  hundred  thousand  piles.  Irs 
it  lie  the  body  of  Canova  and  the  heart  of  Titian,  under  magnifi 
cent  monuments.  Titian  died  at  the  age  of  almost  one  hun 
dred  years.  A  plague  which  swept  away  fifty  thousand  lives 
was  raging  at  the  time,  and  there  is  notable  evidence  of  the 
reverence  in  which  the  great  painter  was  held,  in  the  fact  that 
to  him  alone  the  state  permitted  a  public  funeral  in  all  that 
season  of  terror  and  death. 

In  this  church,  also,  is  a  monument  to  the  doge  Foscari, 
whose  name  a  once  resident  of  Venice,  Lord  Byron,  has  made 
permanently  famous. 

The  monument  to  the  doge  Giovanni  Pesaro,  in  this  church, 
is  a  curiosity  in  the  way  of  mortuary  adornment.  It  is  eighty 
feet  high  and  is  fronted  like  some  fantastic  pagan  temple. 
Against  it  stand  four  colossal  Nubians,  as  black  as  night, 
dressed  in  white  marble  garments.  The  black  legs  are  bare, 
and  through  rents  in  sleeves  and  breeches,  the  skin,  of  shiny 
/  black  marble,  shows.  The  artist  was  as  ingenious  as  his 
funeral  designs  were  absurd.  There  are  two  bronze  skele 
tons  bearing  scrolls,  and  two  great  dragons  uphold  the  sar 
cophagus.  On  high,  amid  all  this  grotesqueness,  sits  the 
departed  doge. 

In  the  conventual  buildings  attached  to  this  church  are  the 
state  archives  of  Venice.  We  did  not  see  them,  but  they  are 
said  to  number  millions  of  documents.  "They  are  the  records 
of  centuries  of  the  most  watchful,  observant,  and  suspicious 
government  that  ever  existed — in  which  everything  was 
written  down  and  nothing  spoken  out."  They  fill  nearly  three 
hundred  rooms.  Among  them  are  manuscripts  from,  the 
archives  of  nearly  two  thousand  families,  monasteries,  and 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  159 

convents.  The  secret  history  of  Venice  for  a  thousand  .years 
is  here — its  plots,  its  hidden  trials,  its  assassinations,  its 
commissions  of  hireling  spies  and  masked  bravoes — food,  ready 
to  hand,  for  a  world  of  dark  and  mysterious  romances. 

Yes,  I  think  we  have  seen  all  of  Venice.  We  have  seen, 
in  these  old  churches,  a  profusion  of  costly  and  elaborate 
sepulcher  ornamentation  such  as  we  never  dreamt  of  before. 
We  have  stood  in  the  dim  religious  light  of  these  hoary  sanc 
tuaries,  in  the  midst  of  long  ranks  of  dusty  monuments  and 
effigies  of  the  great  dead  of  Venice,  until  we  seemed  drifting 
back,  back,  back,  into  the  solemn  past,  and  looking  upon  the 
scenes  and  mingling  with  the  people  of  a  remote  antiquity. 
Wre  have  been  in  a  half -waking  sort  of  dream  all  the  time. 
I  do  not  know  how  else  to  describe  the  feeling.  A  part  of 
our  being  has  remained  still  in  the  nineteenth  century,  while 
another  part  of  it  has  seemed  in  some  unaccountable  way 
walking  among  the  phantoms  of  the  tenth. 

We  have  seen  famous  pictures  until  our  eyes  are  weary 
with  looking  at  them  and  refuse  to  find  interest  in  them  any 
longer.  And  what  wonder,  when  there  are  twelve  hundred 
pictures  by  Palma  the  Younger  in  Venice  and  fifteen  hundred 
by  Tintoretto?  And  behold,  there  are  Titians  and  the  works 
of  other  artists  in  proportion.  We  have  seen  Titian's  cele 
brated  "Cain  and  Abel,"  his  "David  and  Goliath,"  his  "Abra 
ham's  Sacrifice."  We  have  seen  Tintoretto's  monster  picture, 
which  is  seventy-four  feet  long  and  I  do  not  know  how  many 
feet  high,  and  thought  it  a  very  commodious  picture.  We 
have  seen  pictures  of  martyrs  enough,  and  saints  enough,  to 
regenerate  the  world.  I  ought  not  to  confess  it,  but  still,  since 
one  has  no  opportunity  in  America  to  acquire  a  critical  judg 
ment  in  art,  and  since  I  could  not  hope  to  become  educated  in 
it  in  Europe  in  a  few  short  weeks,  I  may  therefore  as  well 
acknowledge  with  such  apologies  as  may  be  due,  that  to  me 
it  seemed  that  when  I  had  seen  one  of  these  martyrs  I  had 
seen  them  all.  They  all  have  a  marked  family  resemblance 
to  each  other,  they  dress  alike,  in  coarse  monkish  robes  and 
sandals,  they  are  all  bald-headed,  they  all  stand  in  about  the 
same  attitude,  and  without  exception  they  are  gazing  heaven 
ward  with  countenances  which  the  Ainsworths,  the  Mortons, 
and  the  Williamses,  et  fits,  inform  me  are  full  of  "expression." 
To  me  there  is  nothing  tangible  about  these  imaginary  por 
traits,  nothing  that  I  can  grasp  and  take  a  living  interest  in. 
If  great  Titian  had  only  been  gifted  with  prophecy,  and  had 


160  MARK  TWAIN 

skipped  a  martyr,  and  gone  over  to  England  and  painted  a 
portrait  of  Shakespeare,  even  as  a  youth,  which  we  could  all 
have  confidence  in  now,  the  world  down  to  the  latest  genera 
tions  would  have  forgiven  the  lost  martyr  in  the  rescued  seer. 
I  think  posterity  could  have  spared  one  more  martyr  for  the 
sake  of  a  great  historical  picture  of  Titian's  time  and  painted 
by  his  brush — such  as  Columbus  returning  in  chains  from  the 
discovery  of  a  world,  for  instance.  The  old  masters  did  paint 
some  Venetian  historical  pictures,  and  these  we  did  not  tire 
of  looking  at,  notwithstanding  representations  of  the  formal 
introduction  of  defunct  Doges  to  the  Virgin  Mary  in  regions 
beyond  the  clouds  clashed  rather  harshly  with  the  proprieties, 
it  seemed  to  us. 

But,  humble  as  we  are,  and  unpretending,  in  the  matter  of 
art,  our  researches  among  the  painted  monks  and  martyrs 
have  not  been  wholly  in  vain.  We  have  striven  hard  to  learn, 
We  have  had  some  success.  WTe  have  mastered  some  things, 
possibly  of  trifling  import  in  the  eyes  of  the  learned,  but  to 
us  they  give  pleasure,  and  we  take  as  much  pride  in  our 
little  acquirements  as  do  others  who  have  learned  far  more, 
and  we  do  love  to  display  them  full  as  well.  When  we  see  a 
monk  going  about  with  a  lion  and  looking  tranquilly  up  to 
heaven,  we  know  that  that  is  St.  Mark.  When  we  see  a  monk 
with  a  book  and  pen,  looking  tranquilly  up  to  heaven,  trying 
to  think  of  a  word,  we  know  that  that  is  St.  Matthew.  When 
we  see  a  monk  sitting  on  a  rock,  looking  tranquilly  up  to 
heaven,  with  a  human  skull  beside  him,  and  without  other 
baggage,  we  know  that  that  is  St.  Jerome.  Because  we  know 
that  he  always  went  flying  light  in  the  matter  of  baggage. 
When  we  see  a  party  looking  tranquilly  up  to  heaven,  uncon 
scious  that  his  body  is  shot  through  and  through  with  arrows^ 
we  know  that  is  St.  Sebastian.  When  we  see  other  monks 
looking  tranquilly  up  to  heaven,  but  having  no  trade-mark,  we 
always  ask  who  those  parties  are.  We  do  this  because  we 
humbly  wish  to  learn.  We  have  seen  thirteen  thousand  St. 
Jeromes,  and  twenty-two  thousand  St.  Marks,  and  sixteen 
thousand  St.  Matthews,  and  sixty  thousand  St.  Sebastians, 
and  four  millions  of  assorted  monks,  undesignated,  and  we 
feel  encouraged  to  believe  that  when  we  have  seen  some  more 
of  these  various  pictures,  and  had  a  larger  experience,  we  shall 
begin  to  take  an  absorbing  interest  in  them  like  our  cultivated 
countrymen  from  Amerique. 

Now  it  does  give  me  real  pain  to   speak  in  this   almost 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  161 

unappreciative  way  of  the  old  masters  and  their  martyrs, 
because  good  friends  of  mine  in  the  ship — friends  who  do 
thoroughly  and  conscientiously  appreciate  them  and  are  in 
every  way  competent  to  discriminate  between  good  pictures 
and  inferior  ones — have  urged  me  for  my  own  sake  not  to 
make  public  the  fact  that  I  lack  this  appreciation  and  this 
critical  discrimination  myself.  I  believe  that  what  I  have 
written  and  may  still  write  about  pictures  will  give  them  pain, 
and  I  am  honestly  sorry  for  it.  I  even  promised  that  I  would 
hide  my  uncouth  sentiments  in  my  breast.  But  ^ alas!  I 
never  could  keep  a  promise.  I  do  not  blame  myself  for  this 
weakness,  because  the  fault  must  lie  in  my  physical  organiza 
tion.  It  is  likely  that  such  a  very  liberal  amount  of  space  was 
given  to  the  organ  which  enables  me  to  make  promises,  that 
the  organ  which  should  enable  me  to  keep  them  was  crowded 
out.  But  I  grieve  not.  I  like  no  half-way  things.  I  had 
rather  have  one  faculty  nobly  developed  than  two  faculties  of 
mere  ordinary  capacity.  I  certainly  meant  to  keep  that  promise, 
but  I  find  I  cannot  do  it.  It  is  impossible  to  travel  through 
Italy  without  speaking  of  pictures,  and  can  I  see  them  through 
other's  eyes? 

If  I  did  not  so  delight  in  the  grand  pictures  that  are  spread 
before  me  every  day  of  my  life  by  that  monarch  of  all  the  old 
masters,  Nature,  I  should  come  to  believe,  sometimes,  that 
I  had  in  me  no  appreciation  of  the  beautiful,  whatsoever. 

It  seems  to  me  that  whenever  I  glory  to  think  that  for  once 
I  have  discovered  an  ancient  painting  that  is  beautiful  and 
worthy  of  all  praise,  the  pleasure  it  gives  me  is  an  infallible 
proof  that  it  is  not  a  beautiful  picture  and  not  in  any  wise 
worthy  of  commendation.  This  very  thing  has  occurred  more 
times  than  I  can  mention,  in  Venice.  In  every  single  instance 
the  guide  has  crushed  out  my  swelling  enthusiasm  with  the 
remark : 

"It  is  nothing — it  is  of  the  Renaissance" 

I  did  not  know  what  in  the  mischief  the  Renaissance  was, 
and  so  always  I  had  to  simply  say : 

"Ah !  so  it  is — I  had  not  observed  it  before." 

I  could  not  bear  to  be  ignorant  before  a  cultivated  negro, 
the  offspring  of  a  South  Carolina  slave.  But  it  occurred  too 
often  for  even  my  self-complacency,  did  that  exasperating 
"It  is  nothing — it  is  of  the  Renaissance"  I  said  at  last: 

"Who   is   this   Renaissance?     Where   did   he  come    from? 


162  MARK  TWAIN 

Who   gave   him   permission   to   cram   the   Republic   with   his 
execrable  daubs?" 

We  learned,  then,  that  Renaissance  was  not  a  man;  that 
renaissance  was  a  term  used  to  signify  what  was  at  best  but 
an  imperfect  rejuvenation  of  art.  The  guide  said  that  after 
Titian's  time  and  the  time  of  the  other  great  names  we  had 
grown  so  familiar  with,  high  art  declined;  then  it  partially 
rose  again — an  inferior  sort  of  painters  sprang  up,  and  these 
shabby  pictures  were  the  work  of  their  hands.  Then  I  said, 
in  my  heat,  that  I  "wished  to  goodness  high  art  had  declined 
five  hundred  years  sooner."  The  Renaissance  pictures  suit  me 
very  well,  though  sooth  to  say  its  school  were  too  much  given 
to  painting  real  men  and  did  not  indulge  enough  in  martyrs. 

The  guide  I  have  spoken  of  is  the  only  one  we  have  had 
yet  who  knew  anything.  He  was  born  in  South  Carolina,  of 
slave  parents.  They  came  to  Venice  while  he  was  an  infant. 
He  has  grown  up  here.  He  is  well  educated.  He  reads,  writes, 
and  speaks  English,  Italian,  Spanish,  and  French,  with  perfect 
facility;  is  a  worshiper  of  art  and  thoroughly  conversant  with 
it;  knows  the  history  of  Venice  by  heart  and  never  tires  of 
talking  of  her  illustrious  career.  He  dressed  better  than 
any  of  us,  I  think,  and  is  daintily  polite.  \JJegroes  are  deemed 
as  good  as  white  people,  in  Venice,  and  so  this  man  feels  no 
desire  to  go  back  to  his  native  land.  His  judgment  is  correct?) 

I  have  had  another  shave.     I  was  writing  in  our  front  room 
this  afternoon  and  trying  hard  to  keep  my  attention  on  my 
work  and  refrain  from  looking  out  upon  the  canal.     I   was 
resisting  the  soft  influences  of  the  climate  as  \vell  as  I  could, 
and  endeavoring  to  overcome  the  desire  to  be  indolent  and 
happy.    The  boys  sent  for  a  barber.    They  asked  me  if  I  would 
be  shaved.     I  reminded  them  of  my  tortures  in  Genoa,  Milan,  j 
Como ;  of  my  declaration  that  I  would  suffer  no  more  on  Italian  * 
soil.     I  said:     "Not  any  for  me,  if  you  please." 

I  wrote  on.  The  barber  began  on  the  doctor.  I  heard  him 
say: 

"Dan,  this  is  the  easiest  shave  I  have  had  since  we  left 
the  ship." 

He   said   again,  presently: 

"Why,  Dan,  a  man  could  go  to  sleep  with  this  man  shav 
ing  him." 

Dan  took  the  chair.     Then  he   said: 

"Why,  this  is  Titian.     This  is  one  of  the  old  masters." 

I  wrote  on.     Directly  Dan  said: 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  163 

"Doctor,  it  is  perfect  luxury.  The  ship's  barber  isn't  any 
thing  to  him." 

My  rough  beard  was  distressing  me  beyond  measure.  The 
barber  was  rolling  up  his  apparatus.  The  temptation  was  too 
strong.  I  said : 

"Hold  on,  please.     Shave  me  also." 

I  sat  down  in  the  chair  and  closed  my  eyes.  The  barber 
soaped  my  face,  and  then  took  his  razor  and  gave  me  a 
rake  that  well-night  threw  me  into  convulsions.  I  jumped  out 
of  the  chair :  Dan  and  the  doctor  were  both  wiping  blood  off 
their  faces  and  laughing. 

I  said  it  was  a  mean,  disgraceful  fraud. 

They  said  that  the  misery  of  this  shave  had  gone  so  far 
beyond  anything  they  had  ever  experienced  before,  that  they 
could  not  bear  the  idea  of  losing  such  a  chance  of  hearing 
a  cordial  opinion  from  me  on  the  subject. 

It  was  shameful.  But  there  was  no  help  for  it.  The 
skinning  was  begun  and  had  to  be  finished.  The  tears  flowed 
with  every  rake,  and  so  did  the  fervent  execrations.  The 
barber  grew  confused,  and  brought  blood  every  time.  I  think 
the  boys  enjoyed  it  better  than  anything  they  have  seen  or 
heard  since  they  left  home. 

We  have  seen  the  Campanile,  and  Byron's  house,  and 
Balbi's  the  geographer,  and  the  palaces  of  all  the  ancient 
dukes  and  doges  of  Venice,  and  we  have  seen  their  effeminate 
descendants  airing  their  nobility  in  fashionable  French  attire 
in  the  Grand  Square  of  St.  Mark,  and  eating  ices  and  drinking 
cheap  wines,  instead  of  wearing  gallant  coats  of  mail  and  de 
stroying  fleets  and  armies  as  their  great  ancestors  did  in  the 
days  of  Venetian  glory.  We  have  seen  no  bravoes  with 
poisoned  stilettoes,  no  masks,  no  wild  carnival;  but  we  have 
seen  the  ancient  pride  of  Venice,  the  grim  Bronze  Horses  that 
figure  in  a  thousand  legends.  Venice  may  well  cherish  them, 
for  they  are  the  only  horses  she  ever  had.  It  is  said  there 
are  hundreds  of  people  in  this  curious  city  who  never  have 
seen  a  living  horse  in  their  lives.  It  is  entirely  true,  no  doubt. 

And  so,  having  satisfied  ourselves,  we  depart  to-morrow,  and 
leave  the  venerable  Queen  of  the  Republics  to  summon  her 
vanished  ships,  and  marshal  her  shadowy  armies,  and  know 
again  in  dreams  the  pride  of  her  old  renown. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

SOME  of  the  Quaker  City's  passengers  had  arrived  in 
Venice  from  Switzerland  and  other  lands  before  we  left 
there,  and  others  were  expected  every  day.  We  heard 
of  no  casualties  among  them,  and  no  sickness. 

We  were  a  little  fatigued  with  sight-seeing,  and  so  we  rattled 
through  a  good  deal  of  country  by  rail  without  caring  to  stop. 
I  took  few  notes.  I  find  no  mention  of  Bologna  in  my  memo 
randum-book,  except  that  we  arrived  there  in  good  season,  but 
saw  none  of  the  sausages  for  which  the  place  is  so  justly 
celebrated. 

Pistoia  awoke  but  a  passing  interest. 

Florence  pleased  us  for  a  while.  I  think  we  appreciated  the 
great  figure  of  David  in  the  grand  square,  and  the  sculptured 
group  they  call  the  Rape  of  the  Sabines.  We  wandered 
through  the  endless  collections  of  paintings  and  statues  of  the 
Pitti  and  Uffizzi  galleries,  of  course.  I  make  that  statement 
in  self-defense ;  there  let  it  stop.  I  could  not  rest  under  the 
imputation  that  I  visited  Florence  and  did  not  traverse  its 
weary  miles  of  picture-galleries.  We  tried  indolently  to  recol 
lect  something  about  the  Guelphs  and  Ghibelines  and  the  other 
historical  cut-throats  whose  quarrels  and  assassinations  make 
up  so  large  a  share  of  Florentine  history,  but  the  subject  was 
not  attractive.  We  had  been  robbed  of  all  the  fine  mountain 
scenery  on  our  little  journey  by  a  system  of  railroading  that 
had  three  miles  of  tunnel  to  a  hundred  yards  of  daylight,  and 
we  were  not  inclined  to  be  sociable  with  Florence.  We  had 
seen  the  spot,  outside  the  city  somewhere,  where  these  people 
had  allowed  the  bones  of  Galileo  to  rest  in  unconsecrated 
ground  for  an  age  because  his  great  discovery  that  the  world 
turned  around  was  regarded  as  a  damning  heresy  by  the 
church;  and  we  know  that  long  after  the  world  had  accepted 
his  theory  and  raised  his  name  high  in  the  list  of  its  great  men, 
they  had  still  let  him  rot  there.  That  we  had  lived  to  see  his 
dust  in  honored  sepulture  in  the  Church  of  Santa  Croce  we 
owed  to  a  society  of  literati,  and  not  to  Florence  or  her  rulers. 
We  saw  Dante's  tomb  in  that  church,  also,  but  we  were  glad 
to  know  that  his  body  was  not  in  it;  that  the  ungrateful  city 

164 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  165 

that  had  exiled  him  and  persecuted  him  would  give  much  to 
have  it  there,  but  need  not  hope  to  ever  secure  that  high 
honor  to  herself.  Medicis  are  good  enough^  for  Florence. 
Let  her  plant  Medicis  and  build  grand  monuments  over  them 
to  testify  how  gratefully  she  was  wont  to  lick  the  hand  that 
scourged  her. 

Magnanimous  Florence !  Her  jewelry  marts  are  filled  with 
artists  in  mosaic.  Florentine  mosaics  are  the  choicest  in  all 
the  world.  Florence  loves  to  have  that  said.  Florence  is  proud 
of  it.  Florence  would  foster  this  specialty  of  hers.  She  is 
grateful  to  the  artists  that  bring  to  her  this  high  credit  and 
fill  her  coffers  with  foreign  money,  and  so  she  encourages 
them  with  pensions.  With  pensions !  Think  of  the  lavishness 
of  it.  She  knows  that  people  who  piece  together  the  beautiful 
trifles  die  early,  because  the  labor  is  so  confining,  and  so  ex 
hausting  to  hand  and  brain,  and  so  she  has  decreed  that  all 
these  people  who  reach  the  age  of  sixty  shall  have  a  pension 
after  that!  I  have  not  heard  that  any  of  them  have  called 
for  their  dividends  yet.  One  man  did  fight  along  till  he  was 
sixty,  and  started  after  his  pension,  but  it  appeared  that  there 
had  been  a  mistake  of  a  year  in  his  family  record,  and  so 
he  gave  it  up  and  died.  These  artists  will  take  particles  of 
stone  or  glass  no  larger  than  a  mustard  seed,  and  piece  them 
together  on  a  sleeve-button  or  a  shirt- stud,  so  smoothly  and 
with  such  nice  adjustment  of  the  delicate  shades  of  color  the 
pieces  bear,  as  to  form  a  pygmy  rose  with  stem,  thorn,  leaves, 
petals  complete,  and  all  as  softly  and  as  truthfully  tinted  as 
though  Nature  had  buiided  it  herself.  They  will  counterfeit  a 
fly,  or  a  high-toned  bug,  or  the  ruined  Coliseum,  within  the 
cramped  circle  of  a  breast  pin,  and  do  it  so  deftly  and  so 
neatly  that  any  man  might  think  a  master  painted  it. 

I  saw  a  little  table  in  the  great  mosaic  school  in  Florence 
— a  little  trifle  of  a  center-table — whose  top  was  made  of  some 
sort  of  precious  polished  stone,  and  in  the  stone  was  inlaid 
the  figure  of  a  flute,  with  bell-mouth  and  a  mazy  complication 
of  keys.  No  painting  in  the  world  could  have  been  softer 
or  richer;  no  shading  out  of  one  tint  into  another  could  have 
been  more  perfect ;  no  work  of  art  of  any  kind  could  have  been 
more  faultless  than  this  flute,  and  yet  to  count  the  multitude 
of  little  fragments  of  stone  of  which  they  swore  it  was  formed 
would  bankrupt  any  man's  arithmetic !  I  do  not  think  one  could 
have  seen  where  two  particles  joined  each  other  with  eyes  of 
ordinary  shrewdness.  Certainly  we  cou.ld  detect  no  such 


166  MARK  TWAIN 

blemish.  This  table  top  cost  the  labor  of  one  man  for  ten  long 
years,  so  they  said,  and  it  was  for  sale  for  thirty-five  thousand 
dollars. 

We  went  to  the  Church  of  Santa  Croce,  from  time  to  time, 
in  Florence,  to  weep  over  the  tombs  of  Michael  Angelo, 
Raphael,  and  Machiavelli  (I  suppose  they  are  buried  there, 
but  it  may  be  that  they  reside  elsewhere  and  rent  their  tombs 
to  other  parties — such  being  the  fashion  in  Italy),  and  between 
times  we  used  to  go  and  stand  on  the  bridges  and  admire  the 
Arno.  It  is  popular  to  admire  the  Arno.  It  is  a  great 
historical  creek  with  four  feet  in  the  channel  and  some  scows 
floating  around.  It  would  be  a  very  plausible  river  if  they 
would  pump  some  water  into  it.  They  all  call  it  a  river,  and  they 
honestly  think  it  is  a  river,  do  these  dark  and  bloody  Floren 
tines.  They  even  help  out  the  delusion  by  building  bridges 
over  it.  I  do  not  see  why  they  are  too  good  to  wade. 

How  the  fatigues  and  annoyances  of  travel  fill  one  with 
bitter  prejudices  sometimes !  I  might  enter  Florence  under 
happier  auspices  a  month  hence  and  find  it  all  beautiful,  all 
attractive.  But  I  do  not  care  to  think  of  it  now,  at  all,  nor 
of  its  roomy  shops  filled  to  the  ceiling  with  snowy  marble 
and  alabaster  copies  of  all  the  celebrated  sculptures  in  Europe 
— copies  so  enchanting  to  the  eye  that  I  wonder  how  they  can 
really  be  shaped  like  the  dingy  petrified  nightmares  they  are 
the  portraits  of.  I  got  lost  in  Florence  at  nine  o'clock,  one 
night,  and  stayed  lost  in  that  labyrinth  of  narrow  streets  and 
long  rows  of  vast  buildings  that  look  all  alike,  until  toward 
three  o'clock  in  the  morning.  It  was  a  pleasant  night  and  at 
first  there  were  a  good  many  people  abroad,  and  there  were 
cheerful  lights  about.  Later,  I  grew  accustomed  to  prowling 
about  mysterious  drifts  and  tunnels  and  astonishing  and  inter 
esting  myself  with  coming  around  corners  expecting  to  find 
the  hotel  staring  me  in  the  face,  and  not  findir  g  it  doing  any 
thing  of  the  kind.  Later  still,  I  felt  tired.  I  soon  felt  re 
markably  tired.  But  there  was  no  one  abroad,  now — not  even 
a  policeman.  I  wralked  till  I  was  out  of  all  patience,  and  very 
hot  and  thirsty.  At  last,  somewhere  after  one  o'clock,  I  came 
unexpectedly  to  one  of  the  city  gates.  I  knew  then  that  I 
was  very  far  from  the  hotel.  The  soldiers  thought  I  wanted 
to  leave  the  city,  and  they  sprang  up  and  barred  the  way  with 
their  muskets.  I  said  : 

"Hotel  d'Europe!" 

It  was  all  the  Italian  I  knew,  and  I  was  not  certain  whether 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  167 

that  was  Italian  or  French.  The  soldiers  looked  stupidly  at 
each  other  and  at  me,  and  shook  their  heads  and  took  me  into 
custody.  I  said  I  wanted  to  go  home.  They  did  not  understand 
me.  They  took  me  into  the  guardhouse  and  searched  me, 
but  they  found  no  sedition  on  me.  They  found  a  small  piece 
of  soap  (we  carry  soap  with  us  now),  and  I  made  them  a 
present  of  it,  seeing  that  they  regarded  it  as  a  curiosity.  I  con 
tinued  to  say  Hotel  d'Europe,  and  they  continued  to  shake 
their  heads,  until  at  last  a  young  soldier  nodding  in  the 
corner  roused  up  and  said  something.  He  said  he  knew 
where  the  hotel  was,  I  suppose,  for  the  officer  of  the  guard 
sent  him  away  with  me.  We  walked  a  hundred  or  a  hundred 
and  fifty  miles,  it  appeared  to  me,  and  then  he  got  lost.  He 
turned  this  way  and  that,  and  finally  gave  it  up  and  signified 
that  he  was  going  to  spend  the  remainder  of  the  morning  try 
ing  to  find  the  city  gate  again.  At  that  moment  it  struck  me 
that  there  was  something  familiar  about  the  house  over  the 
way.  It  was  the  hotel ! 

It  was  a  happy  thing  for  me  that  there  happened  to  be  a 
soldier  there  that  knew  even  as  much  as  he  did ;  for  they  say 
that  the  policy  of  the  government  is  to  change  the  soldiery 
from  one  place  to  another  constantly  and  from  country  to 
city,  so  that  they  cannot  become  acquainted  with  the  people 
and  grow  lax  in  their  duties  and  enter  into  plots  and  conspir 
acies  with  friends.  My  experiences  of  Florence  were  chiefly 
unpleasant.  I  will  change  the  subject. 

At  Pisa  we  climbed  up  to  the  top  of  the  strangest  structure 
the  world  has  any  knowledge  of — the  Leaning  Tower.  As 
every  one  knows,  it  is  in  the  neighborhood  of  one  hundred  and 
eighty  feet  high — and  I  beg  to  observe  that  one  hundred  and 
eighty  feet  reach  to  about  the  height  of  four  ordinary  three- 
story  buildings  piled  one  on  top  of  the  other,  and  is  a  very 
considerable  altitude  for  a  tower  of  uniform  thickness  to 
aspire  to,  even  when  it  stands  upright — yet  this  one  leans 
more  than  thirteen  feet  out  of  the  perpendicular.  It  is 
seven  hundred  years  old,  but  neither  history  nor  tradition 
say  whether  it  was  built  as  it  is,  purposely,  or  whether 
one  of  its  sides  has  settled.  There  is  no  record  that  it 
ever  stood  straight  up.  It  is  built  of  marble.  It  is  an 
airy  and  a  beautiful  structure,  and  each  of  its  eight  stories 
is  encircled  by  fluted  columns,  some  of  marble  and  some  of 
granite,  with  Corinthian  capitals  that  w,ere  handsome  when 
they  were  new.  It  is  a  bell-tower,  and  in  its  top  hangs  a 


168  MARK  TWAIN 

chime  of  ancient  bells.  The  winding  staircase  within  is  dark, 
but  one  always  knows  which  side  of  the  tower  he  is  on  be 
cause  of  his  naturally  gravitating  from  one  side  to  the  other 
of  the  staircase  with  the  rise  or  dip  of  the  tower.  Some  of 
the  stone  steps  are  foot-worn  only  on  one  end ;  others  only 
on  the  other  end ;  others  only  in  the  middle.  To  look  down 
into  the  tower  from  the  top  is  like  looking  down  into  a 
tilted  well.  A  rope  that  hangs  from  the  center  of  the  top 
touches  the  wall  before  it  reaches  the  bottom.  Standing  on  the 
summit,  one  does  not  feel  altogether  comfortable  when  he 
looks  down  from  the  high  side;  but  to  crawl  on  your  breast 
to  the  verge  on  the  lower  side  and  try  to  stretch  your  neck- 
out  far  enough  to  see  the  base  of  the  tower,  makes  your  flesh 
creep,  and  convinces  you  for  a  single  moment,  in  spite  of  all 
your  philosophy,  that  the  building  is  falling.  You  handle 
yourself  very  carefully,  all  the  time,  under  the  silly  impression 
that  if  it  is  not  falling  your  trifling  weight  will  start  it  unless 
you  are  particular  not  to  "bear  down"  on  it. 

The  Duomo,  close  at  hand,  is  one  of  the  finest  cathedrals 
in  Europe.  It  is  eight  hundred  years  old.  Its  grandeur  has 
outlived  the  high  commercial  prosperity  and  the  political  im 
portance  that  made  it  a  necessity,  or  rather  a  possibility.  Sur 
rounded  by  poverty,  decay,  and  ruin,  it  conveys  to  us  a  more 
tangible  impression  of  the  former  greatness  of  Pisa  than  books 
could  give  us. 

The  Baptistery,  which  is  a  few  years  older  than  the  Lean 
ing  Tower,  is  a  stately  rotunda  of  huge  dimensions,  and  was 
a.  costly  structure.  In  it  hangs  trie  lamp  whose  measured 
swing  suggested  to  Galileo  the  pendulum.  It  looked  an  in 
significant  thing  to  have  conferred  upon  the  world  of  science 
and  mechanics  such  a  mighty  extension  of  their  clominions  as 
it  has.  Pondering,  in  its  suggestive  presence,  I  seemed  to  see 
a  crazy  universe  of  swinging  disks,  the  toiling  children  of  this 
sedate  parent.  He  appeared  to  have  an  intelligent  expression 
about  him  of  knowing  that  he  was  not  a  lamp  at  all ;  that  he 
vas  a  Pendulum;  a  pendulum  disguised,  for  prodigious  and 
inscrutable  purposes  of  his  own  deep  devising,  and  not  a 
common  pendulum  either,  but  the  old  original  patriarchal  Pen 
dulum — the  Abraham  Pendulum  of  the  world. 

This  Baptistery  is  endowed  with  the  most  pleasing  echo  of 
all  the  echoes  we  have  re"ad  of.  The  guide  sounded  two 
sonorous  notes,  about  half  an  octave  apart;  the  echo  answered 
with  the  most  enchanting,  the  most  melodious,  the  richest 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  169 

blending  of  sweet  sounds  that  one  can  imagine.  It  was  like 
a  long-drawn  chord  of  a  church  organ,  infinitely  softened  by 
distance.  I  may  be  extravagant  in  this  matter,  but  if  this  be 
the  case  my  ear  is  to  blame — not  my  pen.  I  am  describing  a 
memory — and  one  that  will  remain  long  with  me. 

The  peculiar  devotional  spirit  of  the  olden  time,  which 
placed  a  higher  confidence  in  outward  forms  of  worship  than 
in  the  watchful  guarding  of  the  heart  against  sinful  thoughts 
and  the  hands  against  sinful  deeds,  and  which  believed  in  the 
protecting  virtues  of  inanimate  objects  made  holy  by  contact 
with  holy  things,  is  illustrated  in  a  striking  manner  in  one  of 
the  cemeteries  of  Pisa.  The  tombs  are  set  in  soil  brought  in 
ships  from  the  Holy  Land  ages  ago.  To  be  buried  in  such 
ground  was  regarded  by  the  ancient  Pisans  as  being  more 
potent  for  salvation  than  many  masses  purchased  of  the  church 
and  the  vowing  of  many  candles  to  the  Virgin. 

Pisa  is  believed  to  be  about  three  thousand  years  old.  It  was 
one  of  the  twelve  great  cities  of  ancient  Etruria,  that  common 
wealth  which  has  left  so  many  monuments  in  testimony  of  its 
extraordinary  advancement,  and  so  little  history  of  itself  that 
is  tangible  and  comprehensible.  A  Pisan  antiquarian  gave  me 
an  ancient  tear- jug  which  he  averred  was  full  four  thousand 
years  old.  It  was  found  among  the  ruins  of  one  of  the  oldest 
of  the  Etruscan  cities.  He  said  it  came  from  a  tomb,  and  was 
used  by  some  bereaved  family  in  that  remote  age  when  even 
the  Pyramids  of  Egypt  were  young,  Damascus  a  village,  Abra 
ham  a  prattling  infant  and  ancient  Troy  not  yet  dreamt  of,  to 
receive  the  tears  wept  for  some  lost  idol  of  a  household.  It 
spoke  to  us  in  a  language  of  its  own ;  and  with  a  pathos  more 
tender  than  any  words  might  bring,  its  mute  eloquence  swept 
down  the  long  roll  of  the  centuries  with  its  tale  of  a  vacant 
chair,  a  familiar  footstep  missed  from  the  threshold,  a  pleasant 
voice  gone  from  the  chorus,  a  vanished  form ! — a  tale  which  is 
always  so  new  to  us,  so  startling,  so  terrible,  so  benumbing 
to  the  senses,  and  behold  how  threadbare  and  old  it  is !  No 
shrewdly  worded  history  could  have  brought  the  .myths  and 
shadows  of  that  old  dreamy  age  before  us  clothed  with  human 
flesh  and  warmed  with  human  sympathies  so  vividl}r  as  did 
this  poor  little  unsentient  vessel  of  pottery. 

Pisa  was  a  republic  in  the  Middle  Ages,  with  a  government 
of  her  own,  armies  and  navies  of  her  own,  and  a  great  com 
merce.  She  was  a  warlike  power,  and  inscribed  upon  her 
banners  many  a  brilliant  fight  with  Genoese  and  Turks.  It  is 


170  MARK  TWAIN 

said  that  the  city  once  numbered  a  population  of  four  hundred 
thousand;  but  her  scepter  has  passed  from  her  grasp  now, 
her  ships  and  her  armies  are  gone,  her  commerce  is  dead.  Her 
battle-flags  bear  the  mold  and  the  dust  of  centuries,  her  marts 
are  deserted,  she  has  shrunken  far  within  her  crumbling  walls, 
and  her  great  population  has  diminished  to  twenty  thousand 
souls.  She  has  but  one  thing  left  to  boast  of,  and  that  is  not 
much;  viz.,  she  is  the  second  city  of  Tuscany. 

We  reached  Leghorn  in  time  to  see  all  we  wished  to  see 
of  it  long  before  the  city  gates  were  closed  for  the  evening, 
and  then  came  on  board  the  ship. 

We  felt  as  though  we  had  been  away  from  home  an  age. 
We  never  entirely  appreciated,  before,  what  a  very  pleasant 
den  our  stateroom  is;  nor  how  jolly  it  is  to  sit  at  dinner  in 
one's  own  seat  in  one's  own  cabin,  and  hold  familiar  con 
versation  with  friends  in  one's  own  language.  Oh,  the  rare 
happiness  of  comprehending  every  single  word  that  is  said, 
and  knowing  that  every  word  one  says  in  return  will  be  under 
stood  as  well!  We  would  talk  ourselves  to  death  now,  only 
there  are  only  about  ten  passengers  out  of  the  sixty-five  to 
talk  to.  The  others  are  wandering,  we  hardly  know  where. 
We  shall  not  go  ashore  in  Leghorn.  We  are  surfeited  with 
Italian  cities  for  the  present,  and  much  prefer  to  walk  the 
famjliar  quarter-deck  and  view  this  one  from  a  distance. 

tCJie  stupid  magnates  of  this  Leghorn  government  cannot 
understand  that  so  large  a  steamer  as  ours  could  cross  the 
broad  Atlantic  with  no  other  purpose  than  to  indulge  a  party 
of  ladies  and  gentlemen  in  a  pleasure  excursion.  It  looks  too 
improbable.  It  is  suspicious,  they  think.  Something  more 
important  must  be  hidden  behind  it  all.  They  cannot  under 
stand  it,  and  they  scorn  the  evidence  of  the  ship's  papers.  They 
have  decided  at  last  that  we  are  a  battalion  of  incendiary. 
\  bloodthirsty  Garibaldians  in  disguise !  And  in  all  seriousness 
they  have  set  a  gunboat  to  watch  the  vessel  night  and  day,  with 
orders  to  close  down  on  any  revolutionary  movement  in  a 
twinkling  !y  Police-boats  are  on  patrol  duty  about  us  all  the 
time,  and  it  is  as  much  as  a  sailor's  liberty  is  worth  to  show 
himself  in  a  red  shirt.  These  policemen  follow  the  executive 
officer's  boat  from  shore  to  ship  and  from  ship  to  shore,  and 
watch  his  dark  manceuvers  with  a  vigilant  eye.  They  will 
arrest  him  yet  unless  he  assumes  an  expression  of  countenance 
that  shall  have  less  of  carnage,  insurrection,  and  sedition  in 
it.  A  visit  paid  in  a  friendly  way  to  General  Garibaldi  yester- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  171 

day  (by  cordial  invitation)  by  some  of  our  passengers,  has 
gone  far  to  confirm  the  dread  suspicions  the  government  har 
bors  toward  us.  It  is  thought  the  friendly  visit  was  only  the 
cloak  of  a  bloody  conspiracy.  These  people  draw  near  and 
watch  us  when  we  bathe  in  the  sea  from  the  ship's  side.  Do 
they  think  we  are  communing  with  a  reserve  force  of  rascals 
at  the  bottom? 

It  is  said  that  we  shall  probably  be  quarantined  at  Naples. 
Two  or  three  of  us  prefer  not  to  run  this  risk.  Therefore, 
when  we  are  rested,  we  propose  to  go  in  a  French  steamer  to 
Civita  Vecchia,  and  from  thence  to  Rome,  and  by  rail  to 
Naples.  They  do  not  quarantine  the  cars,  no  matter  where 
they  got  their  passengers  from. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

THERE  are  a  good  many  things  about  this  Italy  which 
I   do   not  understand — and   more   especially   I   cannot 
understand  how  a  bankrupt  government  can  have  such 
palatial  railroad  depots  and  such  marvels  of  turnpikes.     Why, 
these  latter  are  as  hard  as  adamant,  as  straight  as  a  line,  as 
smooth  as  a  floor,  and  as  white  as  snow.    When  it  is  too  dark 
to  see  any  other  object,  one  can  still  see  the  white  turnpikes  of 
France  and  Italy ;  and  they  are  clean  enough  to  eat  from,  with 
out  a  table-cloth.     And  yet  no  -tolls  are  charged. 

As  for  the  railways — we  have  none  like  them.  The  cars 
slide  as  smoothly  along  as  if  they  were  on  runners.  The 
depots  are  vast  palaces  of  cut  marble,  with  stately  colonnades 
of  the  same  royal  stone  traversing  them  from  end  to  end,  and 
with  ample  walls  and  ceilings  richly  decorated  with  frescoes. 
The  lofty  gateways  are  graced  with  statues,  and  the  broad 
floors  are  all  laid  in  polished  flags  of  marble. 

These  things  win  me  more  than  Italy's  hundred  galleries  of 
priceless  art  treasures,  because  I  can  understand  the  one  and 
am  not  competent  to  appreciate  the  other.  In  the  turnpikes, 
the  railways,  the  depots,  and  the  new  boulevards  of  uniform 
houses  in  Florence  and  other  cities  here,  I  see  the  genius 
of  Louis  Napoleon,  or  rather,  I  see  the  works  of  tliat  states 
man  imitated.  But  Louis  has  taken  care  that  in  France  there 
shall  be  a  foundation  for  these  improvements — money.  He 
has  always  the  wherewithal  to  back  up  his  projects;  they  < 
strengthen  France  and  never  weaken  her.  Her  material  pros 
perity  is  genuine.  But  here  the  case  is  different.  This  country 
is  bankrupt.  There  is  no  real  foundation  for  these  great  works. 
The  prosperity  they  would  seem  to  indicate  is  a  pretense. 
There  is  no  money  in  the  treasury,  and  so  they  enfeeble  her 
instead  of  strengthening.  Italy  has  achieved  the  dearest  wish 
of  her  heart  and  become  an  independent  state — and  in  so 
doing  she  has  drawn  an  elephant  in  the  political  lottery. 
She  has  nothing  to  feed  jt  on.  Inexperienced  in  govern 
ment,  she  plunged  into  all  manner  of  useless  expenditure, 
and  swamped  her  treasury  almost  in  a  day.  She  squandered 

172 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  173 

millions  of  francs  on  a  navy  which  she  did  not  need,  and  the 
first  time  she  took  her  new  toy  into  action  she  got  it  knocked 
higher  than  Gilderoy's  kite — to  use  the  language  of  the  Pil 
grims. 

But  it  is  an  ill  wind  that  blows  nobody  good.  A  year 
ago,  when  Italy  saw  utter  ruin  staring  her  in  the  face  and 
her  greenbacks  hardly  worth  the  paper  they  were  printed  on, 
her  Parliament  ventured  upon  a  coup  de  main  that  would  have 
appalled  the  stoutest  of  her  statesmen  under  less  desperate 
circumstances.  They,  in  a  manner,  confiscated  the  domains 
of  the  Church!  This  in  priest-ridden  Italy!  This  in  a  land 
which  has  groped  in  the  midnight  of  priestly  superstition  for 
sixteen  hundred  years !  It  was  a  rare  good  fortune  for  Italy, 
the  stress  of  weather  that  drove  her  to  break  from  this 
prison-house. 

They  do  not  call  it  confiscating  the  church  property.  That 
would  sound  too  harshly  yet.  But  it  amounts  to  that.  There 
are  thousands  of  churches  in  Italy,  each  with  untold  millions 
of  treasures  stored  away  in  its  closets,  and  each  with  its 
battalion  of  priests  to  be  supported.  And  then  there  are  the 
estates  of  the  Church — league  on  league  of  the  richest  lands 
and  the  noblest  forests  in  all  Italy — all  yielding  immense  reve 
nues  to  the  Church,  and  none  paying  a  cent  in  taxes  to  the 
state.  In  some  great  districts  the  Church  owns  all  the  prop 
erty — lands,  water-courses,  woods,  mills  and  factories.  They 
buy,  they  sell,  they  manufacture,  and  since  they  pay  no  taxes, 
who  can  hope  to  compete  with  them! 

Well,  the  government  has  seized  all  this  in  effect,  and  will 
yet  seize  it  in  rigid  and  unpoetical  reality,  no  doubt.  Some 
thing  must  be  done  to  feed  a  starving  treasury,  and  there  is 
no  other  resource  in  all  Italy — none  but  the  riches  of  the 
Church.  So  the  government  intends  to  take  to  itself  a  great 
portion  of  the  revenues  arising  from  priestly  farms,  factories, 
etc.,  and  also  intends  to  take  possession  of  the  churches  and 
carry  them  on,  after  its  own  fashion  and  upon  its  own  re 
sponsibility.  In  a  few  instances  it  will  leave  the  establish 
ments  of  '-feat  pet  churches  undisturbed,  but  in  all  others  only 
a  handful  of  priests  will  be  retained  to  preach  and  pray,  a 
few  will  l:e  pensioned,  and  the  balance  turned  adrift. 

Pray  glance  at  some  of  these  churches  and  their  embellish 
ments,  and  see  whether  the  government  is  doing  a  righteous 
thing  or  not.  In  Venice,  to-day,  a  city  of  a  hundred  thousand 
inhabitants,  there  are  twelve  hundred  priests.  Heaven  only 


174  MARK  TWAIN 

knows  how  many  there  were  before  the  Parliament  reduced 
their  numbers.  There  was  the  great  Jesuit  Church.  Under 
the  old  regime  it  required  sixty  priests  to  engineer  it — the 
government  does  it  with  five  now,  and  and  others  are  dis 
charged  from  service.  All  about  that  church  wretchedness 
and  poverty  abound.  At  its  door  a  dozen  hats  and  bonnets 
were  doffed  to  us,  as  many  heads  were  humbly  bowed,  and  as 
many  hands  extended,  appealing  for  pennies — appealing  with 
foreign  words  we  could  not  understand,  but  appealing  mutely, 
with  sad  eyes,  and  sunken  cheeks,  and  ragged  raiment,  that  no 
words  were  needed  to  translate.  Then  we  passed  within  the 
great  doors,  and  it  seemed  that  the  riches  of  the  world  were 
before  us!  Huge  columns  carved  out  of  single  masses  of 
marble,  and  inlaid  from  top  to  bottom  with  a  hundred  intricate 
figures  wrought  in  costly  verde  antique;  pulpits  of  the  same 
rich  materials,  whose  draperies  hung  down  in  many  a  pictured 
fold,  the  stony  fabric  counterfeiting  the  delicate  work  of  the 
loom;  the  grand  altar  brilliant  with  polished  facings  and 
balustrades  of  oriental  agate,  jasper,  verde  antique,  and  other 
precious  stones,  whose  names,  even,  we  seldom  hear — and 
slabs  of  priceless  lapis  lazuli  lavished  everywhere  as  recklessly 
as  if  the  church  had  owned  a  quarry  of  it.  In  the  midst  of  all 
this  magnificence,  the  solid  gold  and  silver  furniture  of  the 
altar  seemed  cheap  and  trivial.  Even  the  floors  and  ceilings 
cost  a  princely  fortune. 

Three  hundred  happy,  comfortable  priests  are  employed  in 
that  cathedral. 

And  now  that  my  temper  is  up,  I  may  as  well  go  on  and 
abuse  everybody  I  can  think  of.  They  have  a  grand  mau 
soleum  in  Florence,  which  they  built  to  bury  our  Lord  and 
Saviour  and  the  Medici  family  in.  It  sounds  blasphemous, 
but  it  is  true,  and  here  they  act  blasphemy.  The  dead  and 
damned  Medicis  who  cruelly  tyrannized  over  Florence  and 
were  her  curse  for  over  two  hundred  years,  are  salted  away 
in  a  circle  of  costly  vaults,  and  in  their  midst  the  Holy  Sepul- 
cher  was  to  have  been  set  up.  The  expedition  sent  to  Jeru 
salem  to  seize  it  got  into  trouble  and  could  not  accomplish  the 
burglary,  and  so  the  center  of  the  mausoleum  is  vacant  now. 
They  say  the  entire  mausoleum  was  intended  for  the  Holy 
Sepulcher,  and  was  only  turned  into  a  family  bury  ing-place 
after  the  Jerusalem  expedition  failed — but  you  will  excuse 
me.  Some  of  those  Medicis  would  have  smuggled  themselves 
in  sure.  What  they  had  not  the  effrontery  to  do,  was  not 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  175 

worth  doing.  Why,  they  had  their  trivial,  forgotten  exploits 
on  land  and  sea  pictured  out  in  grand  frescoes  (as  did  also 
the  ancient  doges  of  Venice)  with  the  Saviour  and  the  Virgin 
throwing  bouquets  to  them  out  of  the  clouds,  and  the  Deity 
himself  applauding  from  his  throne  in  Heaven !  And  who 
painted  these  things  ?  Why,  Titian,  Tintoretto,  Paul  Veronese, 
Raphael — none  other  than  the  world's  idols,  the  "old  masters." 

Andrea  del  Sarto  glorified  his  princes  in  pictures  that  must 
save  them  forever  from  the  oblivion  they  merited,  and  they 
Jet  him  starve.  Served  him  right.  Raphael  pictured  such 
infernal  villains  as  Catherine  and  Marie  de  Medici  seated  in 
heaven  and  conversing  familiarly  with  the  Virgin  Mary  and 
the  angels  (to  say  nothing  of  higher  personages),  and  yet  O 
my  friends  abuse  me  because  I  am  a  little  prejudiced  against 
the  old  masters — because  I  fail  sometimes  to  see  the  beauty 
that  is  in  their  productions.  I  cannot  help  but  see  it,  now  and 
then,  but  I  keep  on  protesting  against  the  groveling  spirit 
that  could  persuade  those  masters  to  prostitute  their  noble 
talents  to  the  adulation  of  such  monsters  as  the  French,  Vene 
tian,  and  Florentine  princes  of  two  and  three  hundred  years 
ago,  all  the  same. 

I  am  told  that  the  old  masters  had  to  do  these  shameful 
things  for  bread,  the  princes  and  potentates  being  the  only 
patrons  of  art.  If  a  grandly  gifted  man  may  drag  his  pride  . 
and  his  manhood  in  the  dirt  for  bread  rather  than  starve  with 
the  nobility  that  is  in  him  untainted,  the  excuse  is  a  valid  one. 
It  would  excuse  theft  in  Washingtons  and  Wellingtons,  and 
unchastity  in  women  as  well. 

But,  somehow,  I  cannot  keep  that  Medici  mausoleum  out 
of  my  memory.  It  is  as  large  as  a  church;  its  pavement  is 
rich  enough  for  the  pavement  of  a  king's  palace;  its  great 
dome  is  gorgeous  with  frescoes;  its  walls  are  made  of — what? 
Marble? — plaster? — wood? — paper? — No.  Red  porphyry — 
verde  antique — jasper — oriental  agate — alabaster — mother-of 
pearl — chalcedony — red  coral — lapis  lazuli!  All  the  vast  walls 
are  made  wholly  of  these  precious  stones,  worked  in  and  in 
and  in  together  in  elaborate  patterns  and  figures,  and  polished 
till  they  glow  like  great  mirrors  with  the  pictured  splendors 
reflected  from  the  dome  overhead.  And  before  a  statue  of 
one  of  those  dead  Medicis  reposes  a  crown  that  blazes  with 
diamonds  and  emeralds  enough  to  buy  a  ship  of  the  line, 
almost.  These  are  the  things  the  government  has  its  evil  eye 


1/6  MARK  TWAIN 

upon,  and  a  happy  thing  it  will  be  for  Italy  when  they  melt 
away  in  the  public  treasury. 

And  now —  However,  another  beggar  approaches.  I  will^go 
out  and  destroy  him,  and  then  come  back  and  write  another 
chapter  of  vituperation. 

Having  eaten  the  friendless  orphan — having  driven  away 
his  comrades — having  grown  calm  and  reflective  at  length — I 
now  feel  in  a  kindlier  mood.  I  feel  that  after  talking  so  freely 
about  the  priests  and  the  churches,  justice  demands  that  if  I 
know  anything  good  about  either  I  ought  to  say  it.  I  have 
heard  of  many  things  that  redound  to  the  credit  of  the  priest 
hood,  but  the  most  notable  matter  that  occurs  to  me  now  is 
the  devotion  one  of  the  mendicant  orders  showed  during  the 
prevalence  of  the  cholera  last  year.  I  speak  of  the  Dominican 
friars — men  who  wear  a  coarse,  heavy  brown  robe  and  a  cowl, 
in  this  hot  climate,  and  go  barefoot.  They  live  on  alms  alto 
gether,  I  believe.  They  must  unquestionably  love  their  religion, 
to  suffer  so  much  for  it.  When  the  cholera  was  raging  in 
Naples ;  when  the  people  were  dying  by  hundreds  and  hun 
dreds  every  day;  when  every  concern  for  the  public  welfare 
was  swallowed  up  in  selfish  private  interest,  and  every  citizen 
made  the  taking  care  of  himself  his  sole  object,  these  men 
banded  themselves  together  and  went  about  nursing  the  sick  and 
burying  the  dead.  Their  noble  efforts  cost  many  of  them  their 
lives.  They  laid  them  down  cheerfully,  and  well  they  might. 
Creeds  mathematically  precise,  and  hair-splitting  niceties  of 
doctrine,  are  absolutely  necessary  for  the  salvation  of  some 
kinds  of  souls,  but  surely  the  charity,  the  purity,  the  unselfish 
ness  that  are  in  the  hearts  of  men  like  these  would  save  their 
souls  though  they  were  bankrupt  in  the  true  religion— which 
is  ours. 

One  of  these  fat  barefooted  rascals  came  here  to  Civita 
Vecchia  with  us  in  the  little  French  steamer.  There  were 
only  half  a  dozen  of  us  in  the  cabin.  He  belonged  in  the  steer 
age.  He  was  the  life  of  the  ship,  the  bloody-minded  son  of 
the  Inquisition!  He  and  the  leader  of  the  marine  band  of  a 
French  man-of-\var  played  on  the  piano  and  sang  opera  turn 
about ;  they  sang  duets  together ;  they  rigged  impromptu  theatri 
cal  costumes  and  gave  us  extravagant  farces  and  pantomimes. 
We  got  along  first-rate  with  the  friar,  and  were  excessively 
conversational,  albeit  he  could  not  understand  what  we  said, 
and  certainly  he  never  uttered  a  word  that  we  could  guess  the 
meaning  of. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  177 

This  Civita  Vecchia  is  the  finest  nest  of  dirt,  vermin,  and 
ignorance  we  have  found  yet,  except  that  African  perdition 
they  call  Tangier,  which  is  just  like  it.  The  people  here  live 
in  alleys  two  yards  wide,  which  have  a  smell  about  them  which 
is  peculiar  but  not  entertaining.  It  is  well  the  alleys  are  not 
wider,  because  they  hold  as  much  smell  now  as  a  person  can 
stand,  and,  of  course,  if  they  were  wider  they  would  hold  more, 
and  then  the  people  would  die.  These  alleys  are  paved  with 
stone,  and  carpeted  with  deceased  cats,  and  decayed  rags,  and 
decomposed  vegetable  tops,  and  remnants  of  old  boots,  all 
soaked  with  dish-water,  and  the  people  sit  around  on  stools 
and  enjoy  it.  They  are  indolent,  as  a  general  thing,  and  yet 
have  few  pastimes.  They  work  two  or  three  hours  at  a  time, 
but  not  hard,  and  then  they  knock  off  and  catch  flies.  This 
does  not  require  any  talent,  because  they  only  have  to  grab — 
if  they  do  not  get  the  one  they  are  after,  they  get  another. 
It  is  all  the  same  to  them.  They  have  no  partialities.  Which 
ever  one  they  get  is  the  one  they  want. 

They  have  other  kinds  of  insects,  but  it  does  not  make  them 
arrogant.  They  are  very  quiet,  unpretending  people.  They 
have  more  of  these  kind  of  things  than  other  communities, 
but  they  do  not  boast. 

They  are  very  uncleanly — these  people — in  face,  in  person, 
and  dress.  When  they  see  anybody  with  a  clean  shirt  on,  it 
arouses  their  scorn.  The  women  wash  clothes,  half  the  day, 
at  the  public  tanks  in  the  streets,  but  they  are  probably  some 
body  else's.  Or  maybe  they  keep  one  set  to  wear  and  another 
to  wash;  because  they  never  put  on  any  that  have  ever  been 
washed.  Wrhen  they  get  done  washing,  they  sit  in  the  alleys 
and  nurse  their  cubs.  They  nurse  one  ash-cat  at  a  time,  and 
the  others  scratch  their  backs  against  the  door-post  and  are 
happy. 

All  this  country  belongs  to  the  Papal  states.  They  do  not 
appear  to  have  any  schools  here,  and  only  one  billiard-table. 
Their  education  is  at  a  very  low  stage.  One  portion  of  the  men 
go  into  the  military,  another  into  the  priesthood,  and  the  rest 
into  the  shoemaking  business. 

They  keep  up  the  passport  system  here,  but  so  they  do  in 
Turkey.  This  shows  that  the  Papal  states  are  as  far  advanced 
as  Turkey.  This  fact  will  be  alone  sufficient  to  silence  the 
tongues  of  malignant  calumniators.  I  had  to  get  my  passport 
•vised  for  Rome  in  Florence,  and  then  they  would  not  let  me 


178  MARK  TWAIN 

come  ashore  here  until  a  policeman  had  examined  it  on  the 
wharf  and  sent  me  a  permit.  They  did  not  even  dare  to  let 
me  take  my  passport  in  my  hands  for  twelve  hours,  I  looked 
so  formidable.  They  judged  it  best  to  let  me  cool  down.  They 
thought  I  wanted  to  take  the  town,  likely.  Little  did  they 
know  me.  I  wouldn't  have  it.  They  examined  my  baggage 
at  the  depot.  They  took  one  of  my  ablest  jokes  and  read  it 
over  carefully  twice  and  then  read  it  backward.  But  it  was 
too  deep  for  them.  They  passed  it  around,  and  everybody 
speculated  on  it  awhile,  but  it  mastered  them  all. 

It  was  no  common  joke.  At  length  a  veteran  officer  spelled 
it  over  deliberately  and  shook  his  head  three  or  four  times 
and  said  that,  in  his  opinion,  it  was  seditious.  That  was  the 
first  time  I  felt  alarmed.  I  immediately  said  I  would  explain 
the  document,  and  they  crowded  around.  And  so  I  explained 
and  explained  and  explained,  and  they  took  notes  of  all  I  said, 
but  the  more  I  explained  the  more  they  could  not  understand 
it,  and  when  they  desisted  at  last,  I  could  not  even  understand 
it  myself.  They  said  they  believed  it  was  an  incendiary  docu 
ment,  leveled  at  the  government.  I  declared  solemnly  that  it 
was  not,  but  they  only  shook  their  heads  and  would  not  be 
satisfied.  Then  they  consulted  a  good  while;  and  finally  they 
confiscated  it.  I  was  very  sorry  for  this,  because  I  had  worked 
a  long  time  on  that  joke,  and  took  a  good  deal  of  pride  in  it, 
and  now  I  suppose  I  shall  never  see  it  any  more.  I  suppose 
it  will  be  sent  up  and  filed  away  among  the  criminal  archives 
of  Rome,  and  will  always  be  regarded  as  a  mysterious  infernal 
machine  which  would  have  blown  up  like  a  mine  and  scattered 
the  good  Pope  all  around,  but  for  a  miraculous  providential 
interference.  And  I  suppose  that  all  the  time  I  am  in  Rome 
the  police  will  dog  me  about  from  place  to  place  because  they 
think  1  am  a  dangerous  character. 

It  is  fearfully  hot  in  Cibita  Becchia.  The  street  are  made 
very  narrow  and  the  houses  built  very  solid  and  heavy  and  high, 
as  a  protection  against  the  heat.  This  is  the  first  Italian  town 
I  have  seen  which  does  not  appear  to  have  a  patron  saint.  I  sup 
pose  no  saint  but  the  one  that  went  up  in  the  chariot  of  fire 
could  stand  the  climate. 

There  is  nothing  here  to  see.  They  have  not  even  a  ca 
thedral,  with  eleven  tons  of. solid  silver  archbishops  in  the  back 
room;  and  they  do  not  show  you  any  moldy  buildings  that  are 
seven  thousand  years  old ;  nor  any  smoke-dried  old  fire-screens 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  179 

which  are  chef  d'ceuvres  of  Ruhens  or  Simpson,  or  Titian  or 
Ferguson,  or  any  of  those  parties;  and  they  haven't  any  bot 
tled  fragments  of  saints,  and  not  even  a  nail  from  the  true 
cross.  We  are  going  to  Rome.  There  is  nothing  to  see  here. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

WJ3AT  is  it  that  confers  the  noblest  delight?  What  is 
that  which  swells  a  man's  breast  with  pride  above 
that  which  any  other  experience  can  bring  to  him? 
Discovery !  To  know  that  you  are  walking  where  none  others 
have  walked ;  that  you  are  beholding  what  human  eye  has  not 
seen  before;  that  you  are  breathing  a  virgin  atmosphere.  To 
give  birth  to  an  idea — to  discover  a  great  thought — an  intellec 
tual  nugget,  right  under  the  dust  of  a  field  that  many  a  brain- 
plow  had  gone  over  before.  To  find  a  new  planet,  to 
invent  a  new  hinge,  to  find  the  way  to  make  the  lightnings 
carry  your  messages.  To  be  the  first — that  is  the  idea.  To  do 
something,  say  something,  see  something,  before  anybody  else 
— these  are  the  things  that  confer  a  pleasure  compared  with 
which  other  pleasures  are  tame  and  commonplace,  other  ec 
stasies  cheap  and  trivial.  Morse,  with  his  first  message,  brought 
by  his  servant,  the  lightning;  Fulton,  in  that  long-drawn  cen 
tury  of  suspense,  when  he  placed  his  hand  upon  the  throttle- 
valve,  and  lo,  the  steamboat  moved;  Jenner,  when  his  patient 
with  the  cow's  virus  in  his  blood  walked  through  the  small 
pox  hospitals  unscatched;  Howe,  when  the  idea  shot  through 
his  brain  that  for  a  hundred  and  twenty  generations  the  eye 
had  been  bored  through  the  wrong  end  of  the  needle;  the 
nameless  lord  of  art  who  laid  down  his  chisel  in  some  old  age 
that  is  forgotten  now,  and  gloated  upon  the  finished  Laocoon ; 
Daguerre,  when  he  commanded  the  sun,  riding  in  the  zenith, 
to  print  the  landscape  upon  his  insignificant  silvered  plate,  and 
he  obeyed;  Columbus,  in  the  Pinta's  shrouds,  when  he  swung 
his  hat  above  a  fabled  sea  and  gazed  abroad  upon  an  unknown 
world !  These  are  the  men  who  have  really  lived — who  have 
actually  comprehended  what  pleasure  is — who  have  crowded 
long  lifetimes  of  ecstasy  into  a  single  moment. 

What  is  there  in  Rome  for  me  to  see  that  others  have  not 
seen  before  me?  What  is  there  for  me  to  touch  that  others 
have  not  touched?  What  is  there  for  me  to  feel,  to  learn, 
to  hear,  to  know,  that  shall  thrill  me  before  is  pass  to  others? 
What  can  I  discover?  Nothing.  Nothing  whatsoever.  One 

180 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  181 

charm  of  travel  lies  here.  But  if  I  were  only  a  Roman !  If, 
added  to  my  own  I  could  be  gifted  with  modern  Roman  sloth, 
modern  Roman  superstition,  and  modern  Roman  boundlessness 
of  ignorance,  what  bewildering  worlds  of  unsuspected  wonders 
I  would  discover !  Ah,  if  I  were  only  a  habitant  of  the  Cam- 
pagna  five  and  twenty  miles  from  Rome  !  Then  I  would  travel. 

I  would  go  to  America,  and  see  and  learn,  and  return  to  the 
Campagna  and  stand  before  my  countrymen  an  illustrious 
discoverer.  I  would  say: 

(^1  saw  there  a  country  which  has  no  overshadowing  Mother 
Church,  and  yet  the  people  survived.     I  saw  a  government 
which  never  \vas  protected  by  foreign  soldiers  at  a  cost  greater 
than  that  required  to  carry  on  the  government  itself.     I  saw 
common  men  and  common  women  who  could  read ;  I  even  saw 
small  children  of  common  country-people  reading  from  books ; 
if  I  dared  think  you  would  believe  it,  I  would  say  they  could 
write,  also.     In  the  cities  I  saw  people  drinking  a  delicious 
beverage  made  of  chalk  and  water,  but  never  once  saw  goats  | 
driven  through  their  Broadway  or  their  Pennsylvania  Avenue  ; 
or  their  Montgomery  Street  and  milked  at  the  doors  of  the  • 
houses.     I  saw  real  glass  windows  in  the  houses  of  even  the  j 
commonest  people.      Some  of   the  houses  are  not  of   stone, 
nor  yet  of  bricks ;  I  solemnly  swear  they  are  made  of  wood,  i 
Houses  there  will  take  fire  and  burn,  sometimes — actually  burn  : 
entirely  down,  and  not  leave  a  single  vestige  behind.     I  could  '• 
state  that  for  a  truth,  upon  rny  death-bed.     And  as  a  proof 
that  the  circumstance  is  not  rare,  I  aver  that  they  have  a  thing 
which    they    call    a    fire-engine,    which    vomits    forth    great 
streams  of  water,  and  is  kept  always  in  readiness,  by  night  and 
by  day,  to  rush  to  houses  that  are  burning.    You  would  think 
one  engine  would  be  sufficient,  but  some  great  cites  have  a 
hundred ;  they  keep  men  hired,  and  pay  them  by  the  month 
to  do  nothing  but  put  out  fires.     For  a  certain  sum  of  money 
other  men  will  insure  that  your  house  shall  not  burn  down; 
and  if  it  burns  they  will  pay  you  for  it.     There  are  hundreds 
and  thousands  of  schools,  and  anybody  may  go  and  learn  to 
be  wise,  like  a  priest.     In  that  singular  country,  if  a  rich  man 
dies  a  sinner,  he  is  dammed ;  he  cannot  buy  salvation  with 
money  for  masses.    There  is  really  not  much  use  in  being  rich, 
there.     Not  much  use  as  far  as  the  other  world  is  concerned, 
but  much,  very  much  use,  as  concerns  this ;  because  there,  if 
a  man  be  rich,  he  is  very  greatly  honored,  and  can  become  a  ' 
legislator,  a  governor,  a  general,  a  senator,  no  matter  how 


182  MARK  TWAIN 

ignorant  an  ass  he  is — just  as  in  our  beloved  Italy  the  nobles 
'  hold  all  the  great  places,  even  though  sometimes  they  are  born 
noble  idiots.  There,  if  a  man  be  rich,  they  give  him  costly 
presents,  they  ask  him  to  feasts,  they  invite  him  to  drink  com 
plicated  beverages ;  but  if  he  be  poor  and  in  debt,  they  require 
him  to  do  that  which  they  term  to  'settle/  The  women  put  on 
a  different  dress  almost  every  day;  the  dress  is  usually  fine, 
but  absurd  in  shape;  the  very  shape  and  fashion  of  it  changes 
twice  in  a  hundred  years ;  and  did  I  but  covet  to  be  called  an 
extravagant  falsifier,  I  would  say  it  changed  even  oftener, 
Hair  does  not  grow  upon  the  American  women's  heads;  it  is 
made  for  them  by  cunning  workmen  in  the  shops,  and  is  curled 

I  and  frizzled  into  scandalous  and  ungodly  forms.    Some  persons 
[  wear  eyes  of  glass  which  they  see  through  with  facility  perhaps, 
'  else  they  would  not  use  them;  and  in  the  mouths  of  some  are 

:  teeth  made  by  the  sacrilegious  hand  of  man.    The  dress  of  the 

[!  men  is  laughably  grotesque.    They  carry  no  musket  in  ordinary 
life,  nor  no  long-pointed  pole ;  they  wear  no  wide  green-lined 

'\  cloak;  they  wear  no  peaked  black  felt  hat,  no  leathern  gaiters 

reaching  to  the  knee,  no  goatskin  breeches  with  the  hair  side 

'  out,  no  hob-nailed  shoes,  no' prodigious  spurs.     They  wear  a 

\ conical  hat  termed  a  'nail-kag';  a  coat  of  saddest  black;  a  shirt 

(which  shows  dirt  so  easily  that  it  has  to  be  changed  every 

month,  and  is  very  troublesome ;  things  called  pantaloons,  which 

are  held  up  by  shoulder-straps,  and  on  their  feet  they  wear 

boots  which  are  ridiculous  in  pattern  and  can  stand  no  wear. 

[Yet  dressed  in  this  fantastic  garb,  these  people  laughed  at  my 

[costume.  In  that  country,  books  are  so  common  that  it  is  really 

'no  curiosity  to  see  one.    Newspapers  also.    They  have  a  great 

machine  which  prints  such  things  by  thousands  every  houf^ 

"I  saw  common  men  there — men  who  were  neither  priests 
nor  princes— who  yet  absolutely  owned  the  land  they  tilled. 
It  was  not  rented  from  the  church,  nor  from  the 'nobles.  I 
am  ready  to  take  my  oath  of  this.  (In  that  country  you  might 

|  fall  from  a  third-story  window  three,  several  times,  and  not 

II  mash  either  a  soldier  or  a  priest.    The  scarcity  of  such  people 
/|  is  astonishing^  In  the  cities  you  will  see  a  dozen  civilians  for 

every  soldier,  and  as  many  for  every  priest  or  preacher.  (Jews, 
»  there,  are  treated  just  like  human  beings,  instead  of  clogs. 

They  can  work  at  any  business   they  please;   they   can   sell 

brand-new  goods  if  they  want  to ;  they  can  keep  drug  stores ; 

they  can  practice  medicine  among  Christians;  they  can  even 
.  shake  hands  with  Christians  if  they  choose ;  they  can  associate 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  183 

with  them,  just  the  same  as  one  human  being  does  with  another 
human  being;  they  don't  have  to  stay  shut  up  in  one  corner 
of  the  towns;  they  can  live  in  any  part  of  a  town  they  like 
best;  it  is  said  they  even  have  the  privilege  of  buying  land 
and  houses,  and  owning  them  themselves,  though  I  doubt  that 
myself ;  they  never  have  had  to  run  races  naked  through  the 
public  streets,  against  jackasses,  to  please  the  people  in  carnival 
time;  there  they  never  have  been  driven  by  soldiers  into  a 
church  every  Sunday  for  hundreds  of  years  to  hear  themselves 
and  their  religion  especially  and  particularly  cursed;  at  this 
very  day,  in  that  curious  country,  a  Jew  is  allowed  to  vote, 
hold  office,  yea,  get  up  on  a  rostrum  in  the  public  street  and 
express  his  opinion  of  the  government  if  the  government 
don't  suit  him!  Ah,  it  is  wonderful.  The  common  people 
there  know  a  great  deal ;  they  even  have  the  effrontery  to 
complain  if  they  are  not  properly. governed,  and  to  take  hold 
and  help  conduct  the  government  themselves;  if  they  had  laws 
like  ours,  which  give  one  dollar  of  every  three  a  crop  produces 
to  the  government  for  taxes,  they  would  have  that  law  altered ; 
instead  of  paying  thirty-three  dollars  in  taxes,  out  of  every  ' 
one  hundred  they  receive,  they  complain  if  they  have  to  pay  • 
seven.  Thev  are  curious  people.  They  do  not  know  when  they 
are  well  of??\  Mendicant  priests  do  not  prowl  among  them 
with  baskeTST  oegging  for  the  church  and  eating  up  their  sub 
stance.  One  hardly  ever  sees  a  minister  of  the  Gospel  going 
around  there  in  his  bare  feet,  with  a  basket,  begging  for 
subsistence.  In  that  country  the  preachers  are  not  like  our 
mendicant  orders  of  friars — they  have  two  or  three  suits  of 
clothing,  and  they  wash  sometimes.  In  that  land  are  mountains 
far  higher  than  the  Alban  Mountains;  the  vast  Roman  Cam- 
pagna,  a  hundred  miles  long  and  full  forty  broad,  is  really  small 
compared  to  the  United  States  of  America ;  the  Tiber,  that  cele 
brated  river  of  ours,  which  stretches  its  mighty  course  almost 
two  hundred  miles,  and  which  a  lad  can  scarcely  throw  a  stone 
across  at  Rome,  is  not  so  long,  nor  yet  so  wide,  as  the  American 
Mississippi — nor  yet  the  Ohio,  nor  even  the  Hudson.  ^Tn 
America  the  people  are  absolutely  wiser  and  know  much  moTe 
than  their  grandfathers  did.  They  do  not  plow  with  a  sharp 
ened  stick,  nor  yet  with  a  three-cornered  block  of  wood  that 
merley  scratches  the  top  of  the  ground.  We  do  that  because 
our  fathers  did,  three  thousand  years  ago,  I  suppose.  But 
those  people  have  no  holy  reverence  for  their  ancestors^)  They 
plow  with  a  plow  that  is  a  sharp,  curved  blade  of  iron,  and 


184  MARK  TWAIN 

it  cuts  into  the  earth  full  five  inches.    And  this  is  not  all.    They 

cut  their  grain  with  a  horrid  machine  that  mows  down  whole 

fields  in  a  day.     If  I  dared,  I  would  say  that  sometimes  they 

use  a  blasphemous  plow  that  works  by  fire  and  vapor  and  tears 

uup  an  acre  of  ground  in  a  single  hour—  but—  but-p  see  by 

Ijyour  looks  that  you  do  not  believe  the  things  I  am  telling  you. 

//Alas,  my  character  is  ruined,  and  I  am  a  branded  speaker  01 

/  untruths^) 

/Of  course  we  have  been  to  the  monster  Church  of  St.  Peter, 
frequently.     I  knew  its  dimensions.     I  knew  it  was  a  prodigi- 
ious  structure.    I  knew  it  was  just  the  length  of  the  capitol  at 
j  Washington  —  say  seven  hundred  and  thirty  feet.     I  knew  it 
ilwas  three  hundred  and  sixty-four  feet  wide,  and  consequently 
1  1  wider  than  the  capitol.    I  knew  that  the  cross  on  the  top  of  the 
i'dome  of  the  church  was  four  hundred  and  thirty-eight  feet 
•above  the  ground,  and  therefore  about  a  hundred  or  maybe  a 
j  hundred  and  twenty-five   feet  higher  than  the  dome  of   the 
•  capitol.     Thus  I  had  one  gauge.     I  wished  to  come  as  near 
forming  a  correct  idea  of  how  it  was  going  to  look  as  possible  ; 
I  had  a  curiosity  to   see  how  much   I   would  err.     I   erred 
••  considerably.     St.  Peter's  did  not  look  nearly  so  large  as  the 
capitol,  and  certainly  not  a  twentieth  part  as  beautiful,  from 
the  outside?) 

When  we  reached  the  door,  and  stood  fairly  within  the 
church,  it  was  impossible  to  comprehend  that  it  was  a  very 
large  building.  I  had  to  'cipher  a  comprehension  of  it.  I  had 
to  ransack  my  memory  for  some  more  similes.  St.  Peter's 
is  bulky.  Its  height  and  size  would  represent  two  of  the  Wash 
ington  capitol  set  one  on  top  of  the  other  —  if  the  capitol  were 
wider;  or  two  blocks  or  two  blocks  and  a  half  of  ordinary 
buildings  set  one  on  top  of  the  other.  St.  Peter's  'was  that 
large,  but  it  could  and  would  not  look  so.  The  trouble  was  that 
everything  in  it  and  about  it  was  on  such  a  scale  of  uniform 
vastness  that  there  were  no  contrasts  to  judge  by  —  none  but  the 
people,  and  I  had  not  noticed  them.  They  were  insects.  The 
statues  of  children  holding  vases  of  holy  water  were  immense, 
according  to  the  table  of  figures,  but  so  was  everything  else 
around  them.  The  mosaic  pictures  in  the  dome  were  huge,  and 
were  made  of  thousands  and  thousands  of  cubes  of  glass  as 
large  as  the  end  of  my  little  finger,  but  those  pictures  looked 
smooth,  and  gaudy  of  color,  and  in  good  proportion  to  the 
dome.  Evidently  they  would  not  answer  to  measure  by.  Away 
down  toward  the  far  end  of  the  church  (I  thought  it  was 


/• 
/< 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  185 

really  clear  at  the  far  end,  but  discovered  afterward  that  it 
was  in  the  center,  under  the  dome)  stood  the  thing  they  call 
the  baldacchino — a  great  bronze  pyramidal  framework  like 
that  which  upholds  a  mosquito-bar.  It  only  looked  like  a  con 
siderably  magnified  bedstead — nothing  more.  Yet  I  knew 
it  was  a  good  deal  more  than  half  as  high  as  Niagara  Falls. 
It  was  overshadowed  by  a  dome  so  mighty  that  its  own  height 
was  snubbed.  The  four  great  square  piers  or  pillars  that  stand 
equidistant  from  each  other  in  the  church,  and  support  the  roof, 
I  could  not  work  up  to  their  real  dimensions  by  any  method 
of  comparison.  I  knew  that  the  faces  of  each  were  about  the 
width  of  a  very  large  dwelling-house  front  fifty  or  sixty  feet), 
and  that  they  were  twice  as  high  as  an  ordinary  three-story 
dwelling,  but  still  they  looked  small.  I  tried  all  the  different 
ways  I  could  think  of  to  compel  myself  to  understand  how 
large  St.  Peter's  was,  but  with  small  success.  The  mosaic 
portrait  of  an  Apostle  who  was  writing  with  a  pen  six  feet 
long  seemed  only  an  ordinary  Apostle. 

But  the  people  attracted  my  attention  after  a  while.  To 
stand  in  the  door  of  St.  Peter's  and  look  at  men  down  toward 
its  further  extremity,  two  blocks  away,  has  a  diminishing  effect 
on  them;  surrounded  by  the  prodigious  pictures  and  statues, 
and  lost  in  the  vast  spaces,  they  look  very  much  smaller  than 
they  would  if  they  stood  two  blocks  away  in  the  open  air.  I 
"averaged"  a  man  as  he  passed  me  and  watched  him  as  he 
drifted  far  down  by  the  baldacchino  and  beyond — watched  him 
dwindle  to  an  insignificant  school-boy,  then,  in  the  midst  of 
the  silent  throng  of  human  pygmies  gliding  about  him,  I  lost 
him.  The  church  had  lately  been  decorated,  on  the  occasion 
of  a  great  ceremony  in  honor  of  St.  Peter,  and  men  were  en 
gaged  now  in  removing  the  flowers  and  gilt  paper  from  the 
walls  and  pillars.  As  no  ladders  could  reach  the  great  heights, 
the  men  swung  themselves  down  from  balustrades  and  the 
capitals  of  pilasters  by  ropes,  to  do  this  work.  The  upper 
gallery  which  encircles  the  inner  sweep  of  the  dome  is  two 
hundred  and  forty  feet  above  the  floor  of  the  church — very 
few  steeples  in  America  could  reach  up  to  it.  Visitors  always 
go  up  there  to  look  down  into  the  church  because  one  gets  the 
best  idea  of  some  of  the  heights  and  distances  from  that  point. 
While  we  stood  on  the  floor  one  of  the  workmen  swung  loose 
from  that  gallery  at  the  end  of  a  long  rope.  I  had  not  supposed, 
before,  that  a  man  could  look  so  much  like  a  spider.  He  was 
insignificant  in  size,  and  his  rope  seemed  only  a  thread.  Seeing 


186  MARK  TWAIN 

that  he  took  up  so  little  space,  I  could  believe  the  story,  then, 
that  ten  thousand  troops  went  to  St.  Peter's  once  to  hear  mass, 
and  their  commanding  officer  came  afterward,  and  not  rinding 
them,  supposed  they  had  not  yet  arrived.  But  they  were  in 
the  church,  nevertheless — they  were  in  one  of  the  transepts. 
Nearly  fifty  thousand  persons  assembled  in  St.  Peter's  to  hear 
the  publishing  of  the  dogma  of  the  Immaculate  Conception. 
It  is  estimated  that  the  floor  of  the  church  affords  standing- 
room  for — for  a  large  number  of  people ;  I  have  forgotten  the 
exact  figures.  But  it  is  no  matter — it  is  near  enough. 

They  have  twelve  small  pillars,  in  St.  Peter's,  which  came 
from  Solomon's  Temple.  They  have,  also—which  was  far 
more  interesting  to  me — a  piece  of  the  true  cross,  and  some 
nails,  and  a  part  of  the  crown  of  thorns. 

Of  course,  we  ascended  to  the  summit  of  the  dome,  and, 
of  course,  we  also  went  up  into  the  gilt  copper  ball  which  is 
above  it.  There  was  room  there  for  a  dozen  persons,  with  a 
little  crowding,  and  it  was  as  close  and  hot  as  an  oven.  Some 
of  those  people  who  are  so  fond  of  writing  their  names  in 
prominent  places  had  been  there  before  us — a  million  or  two, 
I  should  think.  From  the  dome  of  St.  Peter's  one  can  see 
every  notable  object  in  Rome,  from  the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo 
to  the  Coliseum.  He  can  discern  the  seven  hills  upon  which 
Rome  is  built.  He  can  see  the  Tiber,  and  the  locality  of  the 
bridge  which  Horatius  kept  "in  the  brave  days  of  old"  when 
Lars  Porsena  attempted  to  cross  it  with  his  invading  host.  He 
can  see  the  spot  where  the  Horatii  and  the  Curiatii  fought  their 
famous  battle.  He  can  see  the  broad  green  Campagna,  stretch 
ing  away  toward  the  mountains,  with  its  scattered  arches  and 
broken  aqueducts  of  the  olden  time,  so  picturesque  in  their 
gray  ruin,  and  so  daintily  festooned  with  vines.  He  can  see- 
the  Alban  Mountains,  the  Apennines,  the  Sabine  Hills,  and* 
the  blue  Mediterranean.  He  can  see  a  panorama  that  is  varied, 
extensive,  beautiful  to  the  eye,  and  more  illustrious  in  history 
than  any  other  in  Europe.  About  his  feet  is  spread  the  remnant 
of  a  city  that  once  had  a  population  of  four  million  souls ;  and 
among  its  massed  edifices  stand  the  ruins  of  temples,  columns, 
and  triumphal  arches  that  knew  the  Caesars,  and  the  noonday 
pf  Roman  splendor ;  and  close  by  them,  in  unimpaired  strength, 
is  a  drain  of  arched  and  heavy  masonry  that  belonged  to  that 
older  city  which  stood  here  before  Romulus  and  Remus  were 
born  or  Rome  thought  of.  The  Appian  Way  is  here  yet,  and 
looking  much  as  it  did,  perhaps,  when  the  triumphal  processions 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  187 

of  the  emperors  moved  over  it  in  other  days  bringing  fettered 
princes  from  the  confines  of  the  earth.  We  cannot  see  the  long 
array  of  chariots  and  mail-clad  men  laden  with  the  spoils  of 
conquest,  but  we  can  imagine  the  pageant,  after  a  fashion. 
We  look  out  upon  many  objects  of  interest  from  the  dome  of 
St.  Peter's;  and  last  of  all,  almost  at  our  feet,  our  eyes  rest 
upon  the  building  which  was  once  the  Inquisition.  How  times 
changed,  between  the  older  ages  and  the  new !  Some  seventeen 
or  eighteen  centuries  ago,  the  ignorant  men  of  Rome  were  wont 
to  put  Christians  in  the  arena  of  the  Coliseum  yonder,  and 
turn  the  wild  beasts  in  upon  them  for  a  show.  It  was  for  a  les 
son  as  well.  It  was  to  teach  the  people  to  abhor  and  fear  the 
new  doctrine  the  followers  of  Christ  were  teaching.  The 
beasts  tore  the  victims  limb  from  limb  and  made  poor  mangled 
corpses  of  them  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye.  But  when  the 
Christians  came  into  power,  when  the  holy  Mother  Church 
.-became  mistress  of  the  barbarians,  she  taught  them  the  error  of 
their  ways  by  no  such  means.  No,  she  put  them  in  this  pleasant 
Inquisition  and  pointed  to  the  Blessed  Redeemer,  who  was 
so  gentle  and  so  merciful  toward  all  men,  and  they  urged  the 
barbarians  to  love  him ;  and  they  did  all  they  could  to  persuade 
them  to  love  and  honor  him — first  by  twisting  their  thumbs 
out  of  joint  with  a  screw;  then  by  nipping  their  flesh  with 
pincers — red-hot  ones,  because  they  are  the  most  comfortable 
in  cold  weather ;  then  by  skinning  them  alive  a  little,  and 
finally  by  roasting  them  in  public.  They  always  convinced 
those  barbarians.  The  true  religion,  properly  administered, 
as  the  good  Mother  Church  used  to  administer,  is  very,  very 
soothing.  It  is  wonderfully  persuasive,  also.  There  is  a  great 
difference  between  feeding  parties  to  wild  beasts  and  stirring 
up  their  finer  feelings  in  an  Inquisition.  One  is  the  system  of 
degraded  barbarians,  the  other  of  enlightened,  civilized  people. 
It  is  a  great  pity  the  playful  Inquisition  is  no  more. 

I  prefer  not  to  describe  St.  Peter's.  It  has  been  done  before. 
The  ashes  of  Peter,  the  disciple  of  the  Saviour,  repose  in  a 
crypt  under  the  baldacchino.  We  stood  reverently  in  that 
place;  so  did  we  also  in  the  Mamertine  Prison,  where  he  was 
confined,  where  he  converted  the  soldiers,  and  where  tradition 
says  he  caused  a  spring  of  water  to  flow  in  order  that  he  might 
baptize  them.  But  when  they  showed  us  the  print  of  Peter's 
face  in  the  hard  stone  of  the  prison  wall  and  said  he  made  that 
by  falling  up  against  it,  we  doubted.  And  when,  also,  the 
monk  at  the  Church  of  San  Sebastian  showed  us  a  paving-stone 


188  MARK  TWAIN 

with  two  great  footprints  in  it  and  said  that  Peter's  feet  made 
those,  we  lacked  confidence  again.  Such  things  do  not  impress 
one.  The  monk  said  that  angels  came  and  liberated  Peter  from 
prison  by  night,  and  he  started  away  from  Rome  by  the  Ap- 
plain  Way.  The  Saviour  met  and  told  him  to  go  back, 
which  he  did.  Peter  left  those  footprints  in  the  stone  upon 
which  he  stood  at  the  time.  It  was  not  stated  how  it  was  ever 
discovered  whose  footprints  they  were,  seeing  the  interview 
occurred  secretly  and  at  night.  The  print  of  the  face  in  the 
prison  was  that  of  a  man  of  common  size ;  the  footprints  were 
those  of  a  man  ten  or  twelve  feet  high.  The  discrepancy  con 
firmed  our  unbelief. 

We  necessarily  visited  the  Forum,  where  Caesar  was  assas 
sinated,  and  also  the  Tarpeian  Rock.  We  saw  the  Dying 
Gladiator  at  the  Capitol,  and  I  think  that  even  we  appreciated 
that  wonder  of  art;  as  much,  perhaps,  as  we  did  that  fearful 
story  wrought  in  marble,  in  the  Vatican — the  Laocoon.  And 
then  the  Coliseum. 

Everybody  knows  the  picture  of  the  Coliseum;  everybody 
recognizes  at  once  that  "looped  and  windowed"  band-box  with 
a  side  bitten  out.  Being  rather  isolated,  it  shows  to  better 
advantage  than  any  other  of  the  monuments  of  ancient  Rome. 
Even  the  beautiful  Pantheon,  whose  pagan  altars  uphold  the 
cross  now,  and  whose  Venus,  tricked  out  in  consecrated  gitn- 
cracks,  does  reluctant  duty  as  a  Virgin  Mary  to-day,  is  built 
about  with  shabby  houses  and  its  stateliness  sadly  marred, 
But  the  monarch  of  all  European  ruins,  the  Coliseum,  main 
tains  that  reserve  and  that  royal  seclusion  which  is  proper 
to  majesty.  Weeds  and  flowers  spring  from  its  massy  arches 
and  its  circling  seats,  and  vines  hang  their  fringes  from  its 
lofty  walls.  An  impressive  silence  broods  over  the  monstrous 
structure  where  such  multitudes  of  men  and  women  were  wont 
to  assemble  in  other  days.  The  butterflies  have  taken  the 
places  of  the  queens  of  fashion  and  beauty  of  eighteen  cen 
turies  ago,  and  the  lizards  sun  themselves  in  the  sacred  seat  of 
the  emperor.  More  vividly  than  all  the  written  histories,  the 
Coliseum  tells  the  story  of  Rome's  grandeur  and  Rome's 
decay.  It  is  the  worthiest  type  of  both  that  exists.  Moving 
about  the  Rome  of  to-day,  we  might  find  it  hard  to  believe  in 
her  old  magnificence  and  her  millions  of  population;  but  with 
this  stubborn  evidence  before  us  that  she  was  obliged  to  have 
a  theater  with  sitting-room  for  eighty  thousand  persons  and 
standing-room  for  twenty  thousand  more,  to  accommodate 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  189 

such  of  her  citizens  as  required  amusement,  we  find  belief  less 
difficult.  The  Coliseum  is  over  one  thousand  six  hundred  feet 
long,  seven  hundred  and  fifty  wide,  and  one  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  high.  Its  shape  is  oval. 

In  America  we  make  convicts  useful  at  the  same  time  that 
we  punish  them  for  their  crimes.  We  farm  them  out  and 
compel  them  to  earn  money  for  the  state  by  making  barrels 
and  building  roads.  Thus  we  combine  business  with  retribu 
tion,  and  all  things  are  lovely.  But  ancient  Rome  they  com 
bined  religious  duty  with  pleasure.  Since  it  was  necessary 
that  the  new  sect  called  Christians  should  be  exterminated,  the 
people  judged  it  wise  to  make  this  work  profitable  to  the  state 
at  the  same  time,  and  entertaining  to  the  public.  In  addition 
to  the  gladiatorial  combats  and  other  shows,  they  sometimes 
threw  members  of  the  hated  sect  into  the  arena  of  the  Coliseum 
and  turned  wild  beasts  in  upon  them.  It  is  estimated  that 
seventy-thousand  Christians  suffered  martyrdom  in  this  place. 
This  has  made  the  Coliseum  holy  ground,  in  the  eyes  of  the 
followers  of  the  Saviour.  And  well  it  might;  for  if  the 
chain  that  bound  a  saint,  and  the  footprints  a  saint  has  left 
upon  a  stone  he  chanced  to  stand  upon,  be  holy,  surely  the 
spot  where  a  man  gave  up  his  life  for  his  faith  is  holy. 

Seventeen  or  eighteen  centuries  ago  this  Coliseum  was  the 
theater  of  Rome,  and  Rome  was  mistress  of  the  world.  Splen 
did  pageants  were  exhibited  here,  in  the  presence  of  the 
emperor,  the  great  ministers  of  state,  the  nobles,  and  vast 
audiences  of  citizens  of  smaller  consequence.  Gladiators 
fought  with  gladiators  and  at  times  with  warrior  prisoners 
from  many  a  distant  land.  It  was  the  theater  of  Rome — of 
the  world — and  the  man  of  fashion  who  could  not  let  fall  in 
a  casual  and  unintentional  manner  something  about  "my 
private  box  at  the  Coliseum"  could  not  move  in  the  first 
circles.  When  the  clothing-store  merchant  wished  to  con 
sume  the  corner-grocery  man  with  envy,  he  bought  reserved 
seats  in  the  front  row  and  let  the  thing  be  known.  When  the 
irresistible  dry-goods  clerk  wished  to  blight  and  destroy,  ac 
cording  to  his  native  instinct,  he  got  himself  up  regardless  of 
expense  and  took  some  other  fellow's  young  lady  to  the 
Coliseum,  and  then  accented  the  affront  by  cramming  her  with 
ice-cream  between  the  acts,  or  by  approaching  the  cage  and 
stirring  up  the  martyrs  with  his  whalebone  cane  for  her  edifica 
tion.  The  Roman  swell  was  in  his  true  element  only  when  he 
stood  up  against  a  pillar  and  fingered  his  mustach  unconscious 


190  MARK  TWAIN 

of  the  ladies ;  when  he  viewed  the  bloody  combats  through  an 
opera-glass  two  inches  long;  when  he  excited  the  envy  of 
provincials  by  criticisms  which  showed  that  he  had  been  to 
the  Coliseum  many  and  many  a  time  and  was  long  ago  over 
the  novelty  of  it ;  when  he  turned  away  with  a  yawn  at  last  and 
said : 

"He  a  star!  handles  his  sword  like  an  apprentice  brigand! 
he'll  do  for  the  country,  maybe,  but  he  don't  answer  for  the 
metropolis !" 

Glad  was  the  contraband  that  had  a  seat  in  the  pit  at  the 
Saturday  matinee,  and  happy  the  Roman  street  boy  who  ate 
his  peanuts  and  guyed  the  gladiators  from  the  dizzy  gallery. 

For  me  was  reserved  the  high  honor  of  discovering  among 
the  rubbish  of  the  ruined  Coliseum  the  only  playbill  of  that 
establishment  now  extant.  There  was  a  suggestive  smell  of 
mint-drops  about  it  still,  a  corner  of  it  had  evidently  been 
chewed,  and  on  the  margin,  in  choice  Latin,  these  words  were 
written  in  a  delicate  female  hand : 

Meet  me  on  the  Tarpcian  Rock  to-morrow  evening,  dear,  at  sharp 
seven.  Mother  will  be  absent  on  a  visit  to  her  friends  in  the  Sabine 
Hills.  CLAUDIA. 

Ah,  where  is  that  lucky  youth  to-day,  and  where  the  little 
hand  that  wrote  those  dainty  lines?  Dust  and  ashes  these 
seventeen  hundred  years ! 

Thus  reads  the  bill: 

ROMAN  COLISEUM. 
UNPARALLELED  ATTRACTION  ! 

NEW  PROPERTIES!     NEW  LIONS!     NEW  GLADIATORS  1  jj 

Engagement  of  the  renowned 
MARCUS  MARCELLUS  VALERIAN! 

FOR  SIX   NIGHTS  ONLY! 

The  management  beg  leave  to  offer  to  the  public  an  entertainment 
surpassing  in  magnificence  anything  that  has  heretofore  been  attempted 
on  any  stage.  ^  No  expense  has  been  spared  to  make  the  opening 
season  one  which  shall  be  worthy  the  generous  patronage  which  the 
management  feel  sure  will  crown  their  efforts.  The  management  beg 
leave  to  state  that  they  have  succeeded  in  securing  the  services  of  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  191 

GALAXY  OF  TALENT! 

such  as  has  not  been  beheld  in  Rome  before. 
The  performance  will  commence  this  evening  with  a 

GRAND    BROADSWORD    COMBAT  1 

between  two  young  and  promising  amateurs  and  a  celebrated  Parthian 
gladiator  who  has  just  arrived  a  prisoner  from  the  Camp  of  Verus. 
This  will  be  followed  by  a  grand  moral 

BATTLE-AX  ENGAGEMENT! 

between  the  renowned  Valerian   (with  one  hand  tied  behind  him)   and 
two  gigantic  savages  from  Britain. 

After  which  the  renowned  Valerian  (if  he  survive)  will  fight  with 
;he  broadsword, 

LEFT  HANDED! 

against  six  Sophomores  and  a  Freshman  from  the  Gladiatorial  College ! 

A  long  series  of  brilliant  engagements  will  follow,  in  which  the 
finest  talent  of  the  Empire  will  take  part. 

After  which  the  celebrated  Infant  Prodigy  known  as 

"THE  YOUNG  ACHILLES," 

will  engage  four  tiger  whelps  in  combat,  armed  with  no  other  weapon 
than  his  little  spear ! 

The  whole  to  conclude  with  a  chaste  and  elegant 

GENERAL  SLAUGHTER! 

in  which  thirteen  African  Lions  and  twenty-two  Barbarian   Prisoners 
will  war  with  each  other  until  all  are  exterminated. 

BOX  OFFICE  NOW  OPEN. 

Dress  Circle  One  Dollar;   Children  and  Servants  half  price. 

An  efficient  police  force  will  be  on  hand  to  preserve  order  and  keep 
the  wild  beasts  from  leaping  the  railings  and  discommoding  the 
audience. 

Doors  open  at  7;  performance  begins  at  8. 

POSITIVELY  NO  FREE  LIST. 

DIODORUS  JOB  PRESS. 


192  MARK  TWAIN 

It  was  as  singular  as  it  was  gratifying  that  I  was  also  so 
fortunate  as  to  find  among  the  rubbish  of  the  arena  a  stained 
and  mutilated  copy  of  the  Roman  Daily  Battle-Ax,  containing 
a  critique  upon  this  very  performance.  It  comes  to  hand  too 
late  by  many  centuries  to  rank  as  news,  and  therefore  I  trans 
late  and  publish  it  simply  to  show  how  very  little  the  general 
style  and  phraseology  of  dramatic  criticism  has  altered  in  the 
ages  that  have  dragged  their  slow  length  along  since  the 
carriers  laid  this  one  damp  and  fresh  before  their  Roman 
patrons : 

THE  OPENING  SEASON. — COLISEUM. — Notwithstanding  the  inclemency 
of  the  weather,  quite  a  respectable  number  of  the  rank  and  fashion 
of  the  city  assembled  last  night  to  witness  the  debut  upon  metropolitan 
boards  of  the  young  tragedian  who  has  of  late  been  winning  such 
golden  opinions  in  the  amphitheaters  of  the  provinces.  Some  sixty 
thousand  persons  were  present,  and  but  for  the  fact  that  the  streets 
were  almost  impassable,  it  is  fair  to  presume  that  the  house  swould 
have  been  full.  His  august  Majesty,  the  Emperor  Aurelius,  occupied 
the  imperial  box,  and  was  the  cynosure  of  all  eyes.  Many  illustrious 
nobles  and  generals  of  the  Empire  graced  the  occasion  with  their 
presence,  and  not  the  least  among  them  was  the  young  patrician 
lieutenant  whose  laurels,  won  in  the  ranks  of  the  'Thundering  Legion," 
are  still  so  green  upon  his  brow.  The  cheer  which  greeted  his  entrance 
was  heard  beyond  the  Tiber  1 

The  late  repairs  and  decorations  add  both  to  the  comeliness  and 
the  comfort  of  the  Coliseum.  The  new  cushions  are  a  great  improve 
ment  upon  the  hard  marble  seats  we  have  been  so  long  accustomed  to. 
The  present  management  deserve  well  of  the  public.  They  have  re 
stored  to  the  Coliseum  the  gilding,  the  rich  upholstery,  and  the  uniform 
magnificence  which  old  Coliseum  frequenters  tell  us  Rome  was  so 
proud  of  fifty  years  ago. 

The  opening  scene  last  night — the  broadsword  combat  between  two  . 
young  amateurs  and  a  famous  Parthian  gladiator  who  was  sent  here  i 
a  prisoner — was  very  fine.  The  elder  of  the  two  young  gentlemen 
handled  his  weapon  with  a  grace  that  marked  the  possession  of  extra 
ordinary  talent.  His  feint  of  thrusting,  followed  instantly  by  a  happily 
delivered  blow  which  unhelmeted  the  Parthian,  was  received  with 
hearty  applause.  He  was  not  thoroughly  up  in  the  backhanded  stroke, 
but  it  was  very  gratifying  to  his  numerous  ifriends  to  know,  that  in 
time,  practice  would  have  overcome  this  defect.  However,  he  was 
killed.  His  sisters,  who  were  present,  expressed  considerable  regret. 
His  mother  left  the  Coliseum.  The  other  youth  maintained  the  con 
test  with  such  spirit  as  to  call  forth  enthusiastic  bursts  of  applause, 
When  at  last  he  fell  a  corpse,  his  aged  mother  ran  screaming,  with 
hair  disheveled  and  tears  streaming  from  her  eyes,  and  swooned  away 
just  as  her  hands  were  clutching  at  the  railings  of  the  arena.  She 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  193 

was  promptly  removed  by  the  police.  Under  the  circumstances  the 
woman's  conduct  was  pardonable,  perhaps,  but  we  suggest  that  such 
exhibitions  interfere  with  the  decorum  which  should  be  preserved 
during  the  performances,  and  are  highly  improper  in  the  presence  of 
the  Emperor.  The  Parthian  prisoner  fought  bravely  and  well;  and 
well  he  might,  for  he  was  fighting  for  both  life  and  liberty.  His  wife 
and  children  were  there  to  nerve  his  arm  with  their  love,  and  to  re 
mind  him  of  the  old  home  he  should  see  again  if  he  conquered.  When 
his  second  assailant  fell,  the  woman  clasped  her  children  to  her  breast 
and  wept  for  joy.  But  it  was  only  a  transient  happiness.  The  captive 
staggered  toward  her  and  she  saw  that  the  liberty  he  had  earned  was 
earned  too  late.  He  was  wounded  unto  death.  Thus  the  first  act 
closed  in  a  manner  which  was  entirely  satisfactory.  The  manager  was 
called  before  the  curtain  and  returned  his  thanks  for  the  honor  done 
him,  in  a  speech  which  was  replete  with  wit  and  humor,  and  closed 
by  hoping  that  his  humble  efforts  to  afford  cheerful  and  instructive 
entertainment  would  continue  to  meet  with  the  approbation  of  the 
.Roman  public. 

The  star  now  appeared,  and  was  received  with  vociferous  applause 
and  the  simultaneous  waving  of  sixty  thousand  handkerchiefs.  Marcus 
Marcellus  Valerian  (stage-name — his  real  name  is  Smith)  is  a  splendid 
specimen  of  physical  development,  and  an  artist  of  rare  merit.  His 
management  of  the  battle-ax  is  wonderful.  His  gaiety  and  his  play 
fulness  are  irresistible,  in  his  comic  parts,  and  yet  they  are  inferior 
to  his  sublime  conceptions  in  the  grave  realm  of  tragedy.  When  his 
ax  was  describing  fiery  circles  about  the  heads  of  the  bewildered  bar 
barians,  in  exact  time  with  his  springing  body  and  his  prancing  legs, 
the  audience  gave  way  to  uncontrollable  bursts  of  laughter ;  but  when 
the  back  of  his  weapon  broke  the  skull  of  pne  and  almost  in  the  same 
instant  its  edge  clove  the  other's  body  in  twain,  the  howl  of  en 
thusiastic  applauses  that  shook  the  building  was  the  acknowledgment 
of  a  critical  assemblage  that  he  was  a  master  of  the  noblest  depart 
ment  of  his  profession.  If  he  has  a  fault  (and  we  are  sorry  to  even 
intimate  that  he  has),  it  is  that  of  glancing  at  the  audience,  in  the 
midst  of  the  most  exciting  moments  of  the  performance,  as  if  seek 
ing  admiration.  The  pausing  in  a  fight  to  bow  when  bouquets  are 
thrown  to  him  is  also  in  bad  taste.  In  the  great  left-handed  combat 
he  appeared  to  be  looking  at  the  audience  half  the  time,  instead  of 
carving  his  adversaries ;  and  when  he  had  slain  all  the  sophomores  and 
was  dallying  with  the  freshman,  he  stooped  and  snatched  a  bouquet 
as  it  fell,  and  offered  it  to  his  adversary  at  a  time  when  a  blow  was 
descending  which  promised  favorably  to  be  his  death-warrant.  Such 
levity  is  proper  enough  in  the  provinces,  we  make  no  doubt,  but  it 
ill  suits  the  dignity  of  the  metropolis.  We  trust  our  young  friend 
will  take  these  remarks  in  good  part,  for  we  mean  them  solely  for 
his  benefit.  All  who  know  us  are  aware  that  although  we  are  at 
times  justly  severe  upon  tigers  and  martyrs,  we  never  intentionally 
•offend  gladiators. 


194  MARK  TWAIN 

The  Infant  Prodigy  performed  wonders.  He  overcame  his  four 
tiger  whelps  with  ease,  and  with  no  other  hurt  than  the  loss  of  a 
portion  of  his  scalp.  The  General  Slaughter  was  rendered  with  a 
faithfulness  to  details  which  reflects  the  highest  credit  upon  the  late 
participants  in  it. 

Upon  the  whole,  last  night's  performances  shed  honor  not  only 
upon  the  management  but  upon  the  city  that  encourages  and  sustains 
such  wholesome  and  instructive  entertainments.  We  would  simply 
suggest  that  the  practice  of  vulgar  young  boys  in  the  gallery  of  shying 
peanuts  and  paper  pellets  at  the  tigers,  and  saying  "Hi-yil"  and  mani 
festing  approbation  or  dissatisfaction  by  such  observations  as  "Bully 
for  the  lion!"  "Go  it,  Gladdy!"  "Boots!"  "Speech!"  Take  a  walk 
round  the  block!"  and  so  on,  are  extremely  reprehensible,  when  the 
Emperor  is  present,  and  ought  to  be  stopped  by  the  police.  Several 
times  last  night  when  the  supernumeraries  entered  the  arena  to  drag" 
out  the  bodies,  the  young  ruffians  in  the  gallery  shouted,  "Supe! 
Supe!"  and  also,  "Oh,  what  a  coat!"  and  "Why  don't  you  pad  them 
shanks?"  and  made  use  of  various  other  remarks  expressive  of  de 
rision.  These  things  are  very  annoying  to  the  audience. 

A  matinee  for  the  little  folks  is  promised  for  this  afternoon,  on, 
which  occasion  several  martyrs  will  be  eaten  by  the  tigers.  Tha 
regular  performance  will  continue  every  night  till  further  notice. 
Material  change  of  program  every  evening.  Benefit  of  Valerian, 
Tuesday,  29,  if  he  lives. 

I  have  been  a  dramatic  critic  myself,  in  my  time,  and  I 
was  often  surprised  to  notice  how  much  more  I  knew  about 
Hamlet  than  Forrest  did ;  and  it  gratifies  me  to  observe,  now. 
how  much  better  my  brethren  of  ancient  times  knew  how  a 
broadsword  battle  ought  to  be  fought  than  the  gladiators. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

SO  far,  good.     If  any  man  has  a  right  to  feel  proud  of 
himself,  and  satisfied,  surely  it  is  I.     For  I  have  written 
about  the  Coliseum  and  the  gladiators,  the  martyrs  and 
the  lions,  and  yet  have  never  once4used  the  phrase  "butchered  to 
make  a  Roman  holiday."     I  am  the  only  free  white  man  of 
mature  age  who  has  accomplished  this  since  Byron  originated 
the  expression. 

Butchered  to  make  a  Roman  holiday  sounds  well  for  the 
first  seventeen  or  eighteen  hundred  thousand  times  one  sees  it 
in  print,  but  after  that  it  begins  to  grow  tiresome.  I  find  it  in 
all  the  books  concerning  Rome  and  here  latterly  it  reminds  me 
of  Judge  Oliver.  Oliver  was  a  young  lawyer,  fresh  from  the 
schools,  who  had  gone  out  to  the  deserts  of  Nevada  to  begin 
life.  He  found  that  country,  and  our  ways  of  life  there,  in 
those  early  days,  different  from  life  in  New  England  or  Paris. 
But  he  put  on  a  woolen  shirt  and  strapped  a  navy  revolver  to 
his  person,  took  to  the  bacon  and  beans  of  the  country,  and 
determined  to  do  in  Nevada  as  Nevada  did.  Oliver  accepted 
the  situation  so  completely  that,  although  he  must  have  sor 
rowed  over  many  of  his  trials,  he  never  complained — that  is, 
he  never  complained  but  once.  He,  two  others,  and  myself, 
started  to  the  new  silver-mines  in  the  Humboldt  Mountains — 
he  to  be  Probate  Judge  of  Humboldt  County,  and  we  to  mine. 
The  distance  was  two  hundred  miles.  It  was  dead  of  winter. 
We  bought  a  two-horse  wagon  and  put  eighteen  hundred 
pounds  of  bacon,  flour,  beans,  blasting-powder,  picks,  and 
shovels  in  it;  we  bought  two  sorry-looking  Mexican  "plugs," 
with  the  hair  turned  the  wrong  way  and  more  corners  on  their 
bodies  than  there  are  on  the  mosque  of  Omar;  we  hitched  up 
and  started.  It  was  a  dreadful  trip.  But  Oliver  did  not  com 
plain.  The  horses  dragged  the  wagon  two  miles  from  town 
and  then  gave  out.  Then  we  three  pushed  the  wagon  seven 
miles,  and  Oliver  moved  ahead  and  pulled  the  horses  after 
him  by  the  bits.  We  complained,  but  Oliver  did  not.  The 
ground  was  frozen,  and  it  froze  our  backs  while  we  slept;  the 
wind  swept  across  our  faces  and  froze  our  noses.  Oliver  did 

195 


196  MARK  TWAIN 

not  complain.  Five  days  of  pushing  the  wagon  by  day  and 
freezing  by  night  brought  us  to  the  bad  part  of  the  journey — 
the  Forty  Mile  Desert,  or  the  Great  American  Desert,  if  you 
please.  Still,  this  mildest-mannered  man  that  ever  was  had 
not  complained.  We  started  across  at  eight  in  the  morning, 
pushing  through  sand  that  had  no  bottom ;  toiling  all  day  long 
by  the  wrecks  of  a  thousand  wagons,  the  skeletons  of  ten 
thousand  oxen;  by  wagon-tires  enough  to  hoop  the  Washing 
ton  Monument  to  the  top,  and  ox-chains  enough  to  girdle  Long 
Island;  by  human  graves;  with  our  throats  parched  always 
with  thirst;  lips  bleeding  from  the  alkali  dust;  hungry,  pers 
piring,  and  very,  very  weary — so  weary  that  when  we  dropped 
in  the  sand  every  fifty  yards  to  rest  the  horses,  we  could  hardly 
keep  from  going  to  sleep — no  complaints  from  Oliver;  none 
the  next  morning  at  three  o'clock,  when  we  got  across,  tired 
to  death.  Awakened  two  or  three  nights  afterward  at  mid 
night,  in  a  narrow  canon,  by  the  snow  falling  on  our  faces,  and 
appalled  at  the  imminent  danger  of  being  "snowed  in,"  we 
harnessed  up  and  pushed  on  till  eight  in  the  morning,  passed 
the  "Divide"  and  knew  we  were  saved.  No  complaints. 
Fifteen  days  of  hardship  and  fatigue  brought  us  to  the  end 
of  the  two  hundred  miles,  and  the  judge  had  not  complained. 
\Ve  wondered  if  anything  could  exasperate  him.  We  built  a 
Humboldt  house.  It  is  done  in  this  way.  You  dig  a  square 
in  the  steep  base  of  the  mountain,  and  set  up  two  uprights  and 
top  them  with  two  joists.  Then  you  stretch  a  great  sheet  of 
"cotton  domestic"  from  the  point  where  the  joists  join  the 
hillside  down  over  the  joists  to  the  ground;  this  makes  the 
roof  and  the  front  of  the  mansion;  the  sides  and  back  are  the 
dirt  walls  your  digging  has  left.  A  chimney  is  easily  made 
by  turning  up  one  corner  of  the  roof.  Oliver  was  sitting  ; 
alone  in  this  dismal  den,  one  night,  by  a  sagebrush  fire,  writ 
ing  poetry;  he  was  very  fond  of  digging  poetry  out  of  him 
self—or  blasting  it  out  when  it  came  hard.  He"  heard  an  ani 
mal's  footsteps  close  to  the  roof;  a  stone  or  two  and  some 
dirt  came  through  and  fell  by  him.  He  grew  uneasy  and  said : 
"Hi — clear  out  from  there,  can't  you!" — from  time  to  time. 
But  by  and  by  he  fell  asleep  where  he  sat,  and  pretty  soon  a 
mule  fell  down  the  chimney !  The  fire  flew  in  every  direction, 
and  Oliver  went  over  backward.  About  ten  nights  after  that 
he  recovered  confidence  enough  to  go  to  writing  poetry  again. 
Again  he  dozed  off  to  sleep,  and  again  a  mule  fell  down  the 
chimney.  This  time,  about  half  of  that  side  of  the  house 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  197 

came  in  with  the  mule.  Struggling  to  get  up,  the  mule  kicked 
the  candle  out  and  smashed  most  of  the  kitchen  furniture,  and 
raised  considerable  dust.  These  violent  awakenings  must  have 
been  annoying  to  Oliver,  but  he  never  complained.  He  moved 
to  a  mansion  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  canon,  because  he 
had  noticed  the  mules  did  not  go  there.  One  night  about  eight 
o'clock  he  was  endeavoring  to  finish  his  poem,  when  a  stone 
rolled  in — then  a  hoof  appeared  below  the  canvas — then  part 
of  a  cow — the  after  part.  He  leaned  back  in  dread,  and 
shouted  "Hooy !  hooy !  get  out  of  this !"  and  the  cow  struggled 
manfully — lost  ground  steadily — dirt  and  dust  streamed  down, 
and  before  Oliver  could  get  well  away,  the  entire  cow  crashed 
through  on  to  the  table  and  make  a  shapeless  wreck  of  every 
thing  ! 

Then,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life,  I  think,  Oliver  com 
plained.  He  said : 

"This  thing  is  grozving  monotonous!" 

The  he  resigned  his  judgeship  and  left  Humboldt  County. 
"Butchered  to  make  a  Roman  holiday"  has  grown  monotonous 
to  me. 

In  this  connection  I  wish  to  say  one  word  about  Angelo 
Buonarotti.  I  used  to  worship  the  mighty  genius  of  Michael 
Angelo — that  man  who  was  great  in  poetry,  painting,  sculp 
ture,  architecture — great  in  everything  he  undertook.  But 
I  do  not  want  Michael  Angelo  for  breakfast — for  luncheon — 
for  dinner — for  tea — for  supper — for  between  meals.  I  like 
a  change,  occasionally.  In  Genoa,  he  designed  everything;  in 
Milan  he  or  his  pupils  designed  everything;  he  designed  the 
Lake  of  Como;  in  Padua,  Verona,  Venice,  Bologna,  who  did 
we  ever  hear  of,  from  guides,  but  Michael  Angelo?  In 
Florence,  he  painted  everything,  designed  everything,  nearly, 
and  what  he  did  not  design  he  used  to  sit  on  a  favorite  stone 
and  look  at,  and  they  showed  us  the  stone.  In  Pisa  he  designed 
everything  but  the  old  shot-tower,  and  they  would  have  at 
tributed  that  to  him  if  it  had  not  been  so  awfully  out  of  the 
perpendicular.  He  designed  the  piers  of  Leghorn  and  the 
custom-house  regulations  of  Civita  Vecchia.  But,  here — here 
it  is  frightful.  He  designed  St.  Peter's ;  he  designed  the  Pope ; 
he  designed  the  Pantheon,  the  uniform  of  the  Pope's  soldiers, 
the  Tiber,  the  Vatican,  the  Coliseum,  the  Capitol,  the  Tarpeian 
Rock,  the  Barberini  Palace,  St.  John  Lateran,  the  Campagna, 
the  Appian  Way,  the  Seven  Hills,  the  Baths  of  Caracalla,  the 
Claudian  Aqueduct,  the  Cloaca  Maxima — the  eternal  bore 


198  MARK  TWAIN 

designed  the  Eternal  City,  and  unless  all  men  and  books  do  lie, 
he  painted  everything  in  it!  Dan  said  the  other  day  to  the 
guide,  "Enough,  enough,  enough!  Say  no  more!  Lump  the 
whole  thing !  say  that  the  Creator  made  Italy  from  design  by 
Michael  Angelo!" 

I  never  felt  so  fervently  thankful,  so  soothed,  so  tranquil,  so 
filled  with  a  blessed  peace,  as  I  did  yesterday  when  I  learned 
that  Michael  Angelo  was  dead. 

But  we  have  taken  it  out  of  this  guide.  He  has  marched  us 
through  miles  of  pictures  and  sculpture  in  the  vast  corridors  of 
the  Vatican;  and  through  miles  of  pictures  and  sculpture  in 
twenty  other  palaces;  he  has  shown  us  the  great  picture  in  the 
Sistine  Chapel,  and  frescoes  enough  to  fresco  the  heavens- 
pretty  much  all  done  by  Michael  Angelo.  So  with  him  we  have 
played  that  game  which  has  vanquished  so  many  guides  for  us 
— imbecility  and  idiotic  questions.  These  creatures  never  sus 
pect —  they  have  no  idea  of  a  sarcasm. 

He  shows  us  a  figure  and  says:  "Statoo  brunzo."  (Bronze 
statue.) 

We  look  at  it  indifferently  and  the  doctor  asks:  "By 
Michael  Angelo?" 

"No — not  know  who." 

Then  he  shows  us  the  ancient  Roman  Forum.  The  doctor 
asks:  "Michael  Angelo?" 

A  stare  from  the  guide.  "No — a  thousan'  year  before  he  is 
born." 

Then  an  Egyptian  obelisk.     Again:  "Michael  Angelo?" 
"Oh,  mon  dieu,  genteelmen !    Zis  is  tzvo  thousan'  year  before 
he  is  born !" 

He  grows  so  tired  of  that  unceasing  question  sometimes,  that 
he  dreads  to  show  us  anything  at  all.  The  wretch  has  tried  ; 
all  the  ways  he  can  think  of  to  make  us  comprehend  that 
Michael  Angelo  is  only  responsible  for  the  creation  of  a  part 
of  the  world,  but  somehow  he  has  not  succeeded  yet.  Relief 
for  overtasked  eyes  and  brain  from  study  and  sight-seeing  is 
necessary,  or  we  shall  become  idiotic  sure  enough.  Therefore 
this  guide  must  continue  to  suffer.  If  he  does  not  enjoy  it,  so 
much  the  worse  for  him.  Wre  do.  . 

In  this  place  I  may  as  well  jot  down  a  chapter  concerning 
those  necessary  nuisances,  European  guides.  Many  a  man  has 
wished  in  his  heart  he  could  do  without  his  guide;  but  know 
ing  he  could  not,  has  wished  he  could  get  some  amusement  out 
pf  him  as  a  remuneration  for  the  affliction  of  his  society.  We 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  199 

accomplished  this  latter  matter,  and  if  our  experience  can  be 
made  useful  to  others  they  are  welcome  to  it. 

Guides  know  about  enough  English  to  tangle  everything  up 
so  that  a  man  can  make  neither  head  nor  tail  of  it.  They  know 
their  story  by  heart — the  history  of  every  statue,  painting, 
cathedral,  or  other  wonder  they  show  you.  They  know  it  and 
tell  it  as  a  parrot  would — and  if  you  interrupt,  and  throw 
them  off  the  track,  they  have  to  go  back  and  begin  over  again. 
All  their  lives  long,  they  are  employed  in  showing  strange 
things  to  foreigners  and  listening  to  their  bursts  of  admiration. 
It  is  human  nature  to  take  delight  in  exciting  admiration.  It 
is  what  prompts  children  to  say  "smart"  things,  and  do  absurd 
ones,  and  in  other  ways  "show  off"  when  company  is  present. 
It  is  what  makes  gossips  turn  out  in  rain  and  storm  to  go  and 
be  the  first  to  tell  a  startling  bit  of  news.  Think,  then,  what 
a  passion  it  becomes  with  a  guide,  whose  privilege  it  is,  every 
day,  to  show  to  strangers  wonders  that  throw  them  into  perfect 
ecstasies  of  admiration !  He  gets  so  that  he  could  not  by  any 
possibility  live  in  a  soberer  atmosphere.  After  we  discovered 
this,  we  never  went  into  ecstasies  any  more — we  never  admired 
anything — we  never  showed  any  but  impassible  faces  and  stupid 
indifference  in  the  presence  of  the  sublimest  wonders  a  guide 
had  to  display.  We  had  found  their  weak  point.  We  have 
made  good  use  of  it  ever  since.  We  have  made  some  of  those 
people  savage,  at  times,  but  we  have  never  lost  our  own  serenity. 

The  doctor  asks  the  questions,  generally,  because  he  can  keep 
his  countenance,  and  look  more  like  an  inspired  idiot,  and  throw 
more  imbecility  into  the  tone  of  his  voice  than  any  man  that 
lives.  It  comes  natural  to  him. 

The  guides  in  Genoa  are  delighted  to  secure  an  American 
party,  because  Americans  so  much  wonder,  and  deal  so  much 
in  sentiment  and  emotion  before  any  relic  of  Columbus.  Our 
guide  there  fidgeted  about  as  if  he  had  swallowed  a  spring 
mattress.  He  was  full  of  animation — full  of  impatience.  He 
said! 

"Come  wis  me,  genteelmen ! — come !  I  show  you  ze  letter- 
writing  by  Christopher  Colombo  ! — write  it  himself  ! — write 
it  wis  his  own  hand ! — come !" 

He  took  us  to  the  municipal  palace.  After  much  impressive 
fumbling  of  keys  and  opening  of  locks,  the  stained  and  aged 
document  was  spread  before  us.  The  guide's  eyes  sparkled. 
He  danced  about  us  and  tapped  the  parchment  with  his  finger : 


200  MARK  TWAIN 

"What  I  tell  you,  genteelmen!  Is  it  not  so?  See!  hand 
writing  Christopher  Colombo! — write  it  himself!" 

We  looked  indifferent — unconcerned.  The  doctor  examined 
the  document  very  deliberately,  during  a  painful  pause.  Then 
he  said,  without  any  show  of  interest: 

"Ah — Furguson — what — what  did  you  say  was  the  name  of 
the  party  who  wrote  this  ?" 

"Christopher  Colombo !  ze  great  Christopher  Colombo !" 

Another  deliberate  examination. 

"Ah — did  he  write  it  himself,  or — or  how?" 

"He  write  it  himself ! — Christopher  Colombo !  he's  own 
handwriting,  write  by  himself !" 

Then  the  doctor  laid  the  document  down  and  said : 

"Why,  I  have  seen  boys  in  America  only  fourteen  years  old 
that  could  write  better  than  that." 

"But  zis  is  ze  great  Christo — " 

"I  don't  care  who  it  is!  It's  the  worst  writing  I  ever  saw, 
Now  you  musn't  think  you  can  impose  on  us  because  we  are 
strangers.  We  are  not  fools,  by  a  good  deal.  If  you  have  got 
any  specimens  of  penmanship  of  real  merit,  trot  them  out ! — 
and  if  you  haven't,  drive  on!" 

We  drove  on.  The  guide  was  considerably  shaken  up,  but 
he  made  one  more  venture.  He  had  something  which  he 
thought  would  overcome  us.  He  said : 

"Ah,  genteelmen,  you  come  wis  me!  I  show  you  beautiful, 
oh,  magnificent  bust  Christopher  Colombo ! — splendid,  grand, 
magnificent !" 

He  brought  us  before  the  beautiful  bust — for  it  was  beauti 
ful — and  sprang  back  and  struck  an  attitude : 

"Ah,  look,  genteelmen! — beautiful,  grand, — bust  Christopher 
Colombo ! — beautiful  bust,  beautiful  pedestal !" 

The  doctor  put  up  his  eyeglass — procured  for  such  occasions : 

"Ah — what  did  you  say  this  gentleman's  name  was?" 

'Christopher  Colombo ! — ze  great  Christopher  Colombo  !" 

"Christopher  Columbo !  ze  great  Christopher  Colombo !" 
Well,  what  did  he  do?" 

"Discover  America! — discover  America,  oh,   ze   devil!" 

"Discover  America.  No — that  statement  will  hardly  wash. 
We  are  just  from  America  ourselves.  We  heard  nothing  about 
it.  Christopher  Colombo — pleasant  name — is — is  he  dead?" 

"Oh,  corpo  di  BaccJio ! — three  hundred  years !" 

"What  did  he  die  of  ?" 

"I  do  not  know ! — I  cannot  tell" 


"IS    HE    DEAD?" 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  201 

"Smallpox,  think?" 

"I  do  not  know,  genteelmen ! — I  do  not  know  what  he  die 
of!" 

"Measles,  likely?" 

"Maybe — maybe — I  do  not  know — I  think  he  die  of  some 
things." 

"Parents  living?'' 

"Im-posseeble !" 

"Ah — which  is  the  bust  and  which  is  the  pedestal?" 

"Santa  Maria ! — sis  ze  bust ! — sis  ze  pedestal !" 

"Ah,  I  see,  I  see — happy  combination — very  happy  com 
bination,  indeed.  Is — is  this  the  first  time  this  gentleman  was 
ever  on  a  bust?" 

That  joke  was  lost  on  the  foreigner — guides  cannot  master 
the  subtleties  of  the  American  joke. 

We  have  made  it  interesting  for  this  Roman  guide.  Yes 
terday  we  spent  three  or  four  hours  in  the  Vatican  again,  that 
wonderful  world  of  curiosities.  We  came  very  near  express 
ing  interest,  sometimes — even  admiration — it  was  very  hard  to 
keep  from  it.  We  succeeded  though.  Nobody  else  ever  did, 
in  the  Vatican  museums.  The  guide  was  bewildered — non 
plussed.  He  walked  his  legs  off,  nearly,  hunting  up  extraordi 
nary  things,  and  exhausted  all  his  ingenuity  on  us,  but  it  was 
a  failure;  we  never  showed  any  interest  in  anything.  He  had 
reserved  what  he  considered  to  be  his  greatest  wonder  till  the 
last — a  royal  Egyptian  mummy,  the  best-preserved  in  the 
world,  perhaps.  He  took  us  there.  He  felt  so  sure,  this  time, 
that  some  of  his  old  enthusiasm  came  back  to  him: 

''See,  genteelmen ! — Mummy !     Mummy !" 

The  eyeglasses  came  up  as  calmly,  as  deliberately  as  ever. 

"Ah, — Furguson — what  did  I  understand  you  to  say  the 
gentleman's  name  was?" 

"Name  ? — he  got  no  name ! — Mummy ! — 'Gyptian  mummy !" 

"Yes,  yes.     Born  here?" 

"No!     'Gyptian  mummy!" 

"Ah,  just  so.    Frenchman,  I  presume?" 

"No  ! — not  Frenchman,  not  Roman ! — born  in  Egypta !" 

"Born  in  Egypta.  Never  heard  of  Egypta  before.  Foreign 
locality,  likely.  Mummy — mummy.  How  calm  he  is — how 
self-possessed.  Is,  ah — is  he  dead?" 

"Oh,  scare  bleu,  been  dead  three  thousan'  year !" 

The  doctor  turned  on  him  savagely: 

"Here,  now,  what  do  you  mean  by  such  conduct  as  this! 


202  MARK  TWAIN 

Playing  us  for  Chinamen  because  we  are  strangers  and  trying 
to  learn !  Trying  to  impose  your  vile  second-hand  carcasses  on 
MJ /—thunder  and  lightning,  I've  a  notion  to— to — if  you've 
got  a  nice  fresh  corpse,  fetch  him  out!— or,  by  George,  we'll 
brain  you!" 

We  make  it  exceedingly  interesting  for  this  Frenchman, 
However,  he  has  paid  us  back,  partly,  without  knowing  it. 
He  came  to  the  hotel  this  morning  to  ask  if  we  were  up,  and 
he  endeavored  as  well  as  he  could  to  describe  us,  so  that  the 
landlord  would  know  which  persons  he  meant.  He  finished 
with  the  casual  remark  that  we  were  lunatics.  The  observa 
tion  was  so  innocent  and  so  honest  that  it  amounted  to  a  very 
good  thing  for  a  guide  to  say. 

There  is  one  remark  (already  mentioned)  which  never  yet 
has  failed  to  disgust  these  guides.  W7e  use  it  always,  when 
we  can  think  of  nothing  else  to  say.  After  they  have  exhausted 
their  enthusiasm  pointing  out  to  us  and  praising  the  beauties 
of  some  ancient  bronze  image  or  broken-legged  statue,  we  look 
at  it  stupidly  and  in  silence  for  five,  ten,  fifteen  minutes — as 
long  as  we  can  hold  out,  in  fact — and  then  ask: 

"Is— is  he  dead?" 

That  conquers  the  serenest  of  them.  It  is  not  what  they  are 
looking  for — especially  a  new  guide.  Our  Roman  Ferguson  is 
the  most  patient,  unsuspecting,  long-suffering  subject  we  have 
had  yet.  We  shall  be  sorry  to  part  with  him.  We  have  en 
joyed  his  society  very  much.  We  trust  he  has  enjoyed  ours, 
but  we  are  harassed  with  doubts. 

We  have  been  in  the  catacombs.  It  was  like  going  down 
into  a  very  deep  cellar,  only  it  was  a  cellar  which  had  no  end 
to  it.  The  narrow  passages  are  roughly  hewn  in  the  rock,  and 
on  each  hand,  as  you  pass  along,  the  hollowed  shelves  are 
carved  out,  from  three  to  fourteen  deep;  each  held  a  corpse  « 
once.  There  are  names,  and  Christian  symbols,  and  prayers, 
or  sentences  expressive  of  Christian  hopes,  carved  upon  nearly 
every  sarcophagus.  The  dates  belong  away  back  in  the  dawn 
of  the  Christian  era,  of  course.  Here,  in  these  holes  in  the 
ground,  the  first  Christians  sometimes  burrowed  to  escape 
persecution.  They  crawled  out  at  night  to  get  food,  but  re 
mained  under  cover  in  the  daytime.  The  priest  told  us  that 
St.  Sebastian  lived  underground  for  some  time  while  he  was 
being  hunted ;  he  went  out  one  day,  and  the  soldiery  discovered 
and  shot  him  to  death  with  arrows.  Five  or  six  of  the  early 
Popes — those  who  reigned  about  sixteen  hundred  years  ago — 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  203 

held  their  papal  courts  and  advised  with  their  clergy  in  the 
bowels  of  the  earth.  During  seventeen  years — from  A.  D.  235 
to  A.  D.  252 — the  Popes  did  not  appear  above  ground.  Four 
were  raised  to  the  great  office  during  that  period.  Four  years 
apiece,  or  thereabouts.  It  is  very  suggestive  of  the  unhealthi- 
ness  of  underground  graveyards  as  places  of  residence.  One 
Pope  afterward  spent  his  entire  pontificate  in  the  catacombs — 
eight  years.  Another  was  discovered  in  them  and  murdered 
in  the  episcopal  chair.  There  was  no  satisfaction  in  being  a 
Pope  in  those  days.  There  were  too  many  annoyances.  There 
are  one  hundred  and  sixty  catacombs  under  Rome,  each  with 
its  maze  of  narrow  passages  crossing  and  recrossing  each  other 
and  each  passage  walled  to  the  top  with  scooped  graves  its 
entire  length.  A  careful  estimate  makes  the  length  of  the  pas 
sages  of  all  the  catacombs  combined  foot  up  nine  hundred 
miles,  and  their  graves  number  seven  millions.  We  did  not  go 
through  all  the  passages  of  all  the  catacombs.  We  were  very 
anxious  to  do  it,  and  made  the  necessary  arrangements,  but 
our  too  limited  time  obliged  us  to  give  up  the  idea.  So  we  only 
groped  through  the  dismal  labyrinth  of  St.  Calixtus,  under  the 
Church  of  St.  Sebastian.  In  the  various  catacombs  are  small 
chapels  rudely  hewn  in  the  stones,  and  here  the  early  Christians 
often  held  their  religious  services  by  dim,  ghostly  lights.  Think 
of  mass  and  a  sermon  away  down  in  those  tangled  caverns 
under  ground ! 

In  the  catacombs  were  buried  St.  Cecilia,  St.  Agnes,  and 
several  other  of  the  most  celebrated  of  the  saints.  In  the  cata 
comb  of  St.  Calixtus,  St.  Bridget  used  to  remain  long  hours  in 
holy  contemplation,  and  St.  Charles  Borromeo  was  wont  to 
spend  whole  nights  in  prayer  there.  It  was  also  the  scene  of  a 
marvelous  thing. 

Here  the  heart  of  St.  Philip  Neri  was  so  inflamed  with  divine  love 
as  to  burst  his  ribs. 

I  find  that  grave  statement  in  a  book  published  in  New 
York,  in  1858,  and  written  by  "Rev.  William  H.  Neligan, 
LL.D.,  M.A.,  Trinity  College,  Dublin;  Member  of  the  Arch 
aeological  Society  of  Great  Britain."  Therefore,  I  believe  it. 
Otherwise,  I  could  not.  Under  other  circumstances  I  should 
have  felt  a  curiosity  to  know  what  Philip  had  for  dinner. 

This  author  puts  my  credulity  on  its  mettle  every  now  and 
then.  He  tells  of  one  St.  Joseph  Calasanctius  whose  house  in 


204  MARK  TWAIN 

Rome  he  visited ;  he  visited  only  the  house — the  priest  has  been 
dead  two  hundred  years.  He  says  the  Virgin  Mary  appeared 
to  this  saint.  Then  he  continues: 

His  tongue  and  his  heart,  which  were  found  after  nearly  a  century 
to  be  whole,  when  the  body  was  disinterred  before  his  canonization, 
are  still  preserved  in  a  glass  case,  and  after  two  centuries  the  heart 
is  still  whole.  When  the  French  troops  came  to  Rome,  and  when 
Pius  VII.  was  carried  away  prisoner,  blood  dropped  from  it. 

To  read  that  in  a  book  written  by  a  monk  far  back  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  would  surprise  no  one ;  it  would  sound  natural 
and  proper ;  but  when  it  is  seriously  stated  in  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  by  a  man  of  finished  education,  an  LL.D., 
M.A.,  and  an  archaeological  magnate,  it  sounds  strangely 
enough.  Still,  I  would  gladly  change  my  unbelief  for  Neligan's 
faith,  and  let  him  make  the  conditions  as  hard  as  he  pleased. 

The  old  gentleman's  undoubting,  unquestioning  simplicity 
has  a  rare  freshness  about  it  in  these  matter-of-fact  railroading 
and  telegraphing  days.  Hear  him,  concerning  the  Church  of 
Ara  Cceli: 

In  the  roof  of  the  church,  directly  above  the  high  altar,  is  engraved, 
"Rcgina  Cecil  Icslarc  Alleluia!'  In  the  sixth  century  Rome  was  visited 
by  a  fearful  pestilence.  Gregory  the  Great  urged  the  people  to  do 
penance,  and  a  general  procession  was  formed.  It  was  to  proceed  from 
Ara  Cceli  to  St.  Peter's.  As  it  passed  before  the  mole  of  Adrian,  now 
the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo,  the  sound  of  heavenly  voices  was  heard 
singing  (it  was  Easter  morn) — "Rcgina  Cecil,  l&tarel  alleluia!  qula 
quern  mcrulsti  portare,  alleluia!  rcsurrcxit  sicut  dixlt;  alleluia!"  The 
Pontiff,  carrying  in  his  hands  the  portrait  of  the  Virgin  (which  is 
over  the  high  altar  and  is  said  to  have  been  painted  by  St.  Luke), 
answered,  with  the  astonished  people,  "Ora  pro  nobis  Deuin,  alleluia/" 
At  the  same  time  and  angel  was  seen  to  put  up  a  sword  in  a  scabbard, 
and  the  pestilence  ceased  on  the  same  day.  There  are  four  circum 
stances  which  confirm1  this  miracle:  the  annual  procession  which  takes 
place  in  the  western  church  on  the  feast  of  St.  Mark:  the  statue  of 
St.  Michael,  placed  on  the  mole  of  Adrian,  which  has  since  that  time 
been  called  the  Castle  of  St.  Angelo ;  the.  antiphon  Regina  Cceli,  which 
the  Catholic  church  sings  during  paschal  time;  and  the  inscription 
in  the  church. 

italics  are  mine. — M.  T. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

FROM  the  sanguinary  sports  of  the  Holy  Inquisition;  the 
slaughter  of  the  Coliseum;  and  the  dismal  tombs  of  the 
Catacombs,  I  naturally  pass  to  the  picturesque  horrors 
of  the  Capuchin  Convent.     We  stopped  a  moment  in  a  small 
chapel  in  the  church  to  admire  a  picture  of  St.  Michael  van 
quishing  Satan — a  picture  which  is  so  beautiful  that  I  cannot 
but  think  it  belongs  to  the  reviled  "Renaissance,"  notwithstand 
ing  I  believe  they  told  us  one  of  the  ancient  old  masters  painted 
it — and  then  we  descended  into  the  vast  vault  underneath. 

Here  was  a  spectacle  for  sensitive  nerves!  Evidently  the 
old  masters  had  been  at  work  in  this  place.  There  were  six 
divisions  in  the  apartment,  and  each  division  was  ornamented 
with  a  style  of  decoration  peculiar  to  itself — and  these  decora 
tions  were  in  every  instance  formed  of  human  bones !  There 
were  shapely  arches,  built  wholly  of  thigh-bones;  there  were 
startling  pyramids,  built  wholly  of  grinning  skulls ;  there  were 
quaint  architectural  structures  of  various  kinds,  built  of  shin- 
bones  and  the  bones  of  the  arm;  on  the  wall  were  elaborate 
frescoes,  whose  curving  vines  were  made  of  knotted  human 
vertebrae ;  whose  delicate  tendrils  were  made  of  sinews  and 
tendons;  whose  flowers  were  formed  of  knee-caps  and  toe- 
nails.  Every  lasting  portion  of  the  human  frame  was  repre 
sented  in  these  intricate  designs  (they  were  by  Michael  Angelo, 
I  think),  and  there  was  a  careful  finish  about  the  work,  and  an 
attention  to  details  that  betrayed  the  artist's  love  of  his  labors 
as  well  as  his  schooled  ability.  I  asked  the  good-natured  monk 
who  accompanied  us,  who  did  this?  And  he  said,  "We  did  it" 
— meaning  himself  and  his  brethern  up-stairs.  I  could  see  that 
the  old  friar  took  a  high  pride  in  his  curious  show.  We  made 
him  talkative  by  exhibiting  an  interest  we  never  betrayed  to 
guides. 

"Who  were  these  people?" 

"We — up-stairs — Monks  of  the  Capuchin  order — my 
brethren." 

"How  many  departed  monks  were  required  to  upholster 
these  six  parlors?" 

205 


206  MARK  TWAIN 

"These  are  the  bones  of  four  thousand." 

"It  took  a  long  time  to  get  enough?" 

"Many,  many  centuries/' 

"Their  different  parts  are  well  separated — skulls  in  one  room, 
legs  in  another,  ribs  in  another — there  would  be  stirring  times 
here  for  a  while  if  the  last  trumpet  should  blow.  Some  of  the 
brethern  might  get  hold  of  the  wrong  leg,  in  the  confusion,  and 
the  wrong  skull,  and  find  themselves  limping,  and  looking 
through  eyes  that  were  wider  apart  or  closer  together  than 
they  were  used  to.  You  cannot  tell  any  of  these  parties  apart, 
I  suppose  ?" 

"Oh,  yes,  I  know  many  of  them." 

He  put  his  finger  on  a  skull.  "This  was  Brother  Anselmo— - 
dead  three  hundred  years — a  good  man." 

He  touched  another.  "This  was  Brother  Alexander — dead 
two  hundred  and  eighty  years.  This  was  Brother  Carlo — dead 
about  as  long." 

Then  he  took  a  skull  and  held  it  in  his  hand,  and  looked 
reflectively  upon  it,  after  the  manner  of  the  grave-digger  when 
he  discourses  of  Yorick. 

"This,"  he  said,  "was  Brother  Thomas*  He  was  a  young 
prince,  the  scion  of  a  proud  house  that  traced  its  lineage  back 
to  the  grand  old  days  of  Rome  well-nigh  two  thousand  years 
ago.  He  loved  beneath  his  estate.  His  family  persecuted  him ; 
persecuted  the  girl,  as  well.  They  drove  her  from  Rome;  he 
followed ;  he  sought  her  far  and  wide ;  he  found  no  trace  of  her. 
He  came  back  and  offered  his  broken  heart  at  our  altar  and 
his  weary  life  to  the  service  of  God.  But  look  you.  Shortly 
his  father  died,  and  likewise  his  mother.  The  girl  returned, 
rejoicing.  She  sought  everywhere  for  him  whose  eyes  had 
used  to  look  tenderly  into  hers  out  of  this  poor  skull,  but  she 
could  not  find  him.  At  last,  in  this  coarse  garb  we  wear,  she 
recognized  him  in  the  street.  He  knew  her.  It  was  too  late. 
He  fell  where  he  stood.  They  took  him  up  and  brought  him 
here.  He  never  spoke  afterward.  Within  the  week  he  died. 
You  can  see  the  color  of  his  hair — faded,  somewhat —  by  this 
thin  shred  that  clings  still  to  the  temple.  This  [taking  up  a 
thigh-bone]  was  his.  The  veins  of  this  leaf  in  the  decorations 
over  your  head,  were  his  finger-joints,  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years  ago." 

This  businesslike  way  of  illustrating  a  touching  story  of  the 
heart  by  laying  the  several  fragments  of  the  lover  before  us 
and  naming  them,  was  as  grotesque  a  performance,  and  as 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  207 

ghastly,  as  any  I  ever  witnessed.  I  hardly  knew  whether  to 
smile  or  shudder.  There  are  nerves  and  muscles  in  our  frames 
whose  functions  and  whose  methods  of  working  it  seems  a 
sort  of  sacrilege  to  describe  by  cold  physiological  names  and 
surgical  technicalities,  and  the  monk's  talk  suggested  to  me 
something  of  this  kind.  Fancy  a  surgeon,  with  his  nippers 
lifting  tendons,  muscles,  and  such  things  into  view,  out  of  the 
complex  machinery  of  a  corpse,  and  observing,  "Now  this 
little  nerve  quivers — the  vibration  is  imparted  to  this  muscle — 
from  here  it  is  passed  to  this  fibrous  substance;  here  its  in 
gredients  are  separated  by  the  chemical  action  of  the  blood — 
one  part  goes  to  the  heart  and  thrills  it  with  what  is  popularly 
termed  emotion,  another  part  follows  this  nerve  to  the  brain 
and  communicates  intelligence  of  a  startling  character — the 
third  part  glides  along  this  passage  and  touches  the  spring  con 
nected  with  the  fluid  receptacles  that  lie  in  the  rear  of  the  eye. 
Thus,  by  this  simple  and  beautiful  process,  the  party  is  in 
formed  that  his  mother  is  dead,  and  he  weeps."  Horrible ! 

I  asked  the  monk  if  all  the  brethren  up-stairs  expected  to  be 
put  in  this  place  when  they  died.  He  answered  quietly : 

"We  must  all  lie  here  at  last." 

See  what  one  can  accustom  himself  to.  The  reflection  that 
he  must  some  day  be  taken  apart  like  an  engine  or  a  clock,  or 
like  a  house  whose  owner  is  gone,  and  worked  up  into  arches 
and  pyramids  and  hideous  frescoes,  did  not  distress  this  monk 
in  the  least.  I  thought  he  even  looked  as  if  he  were  thinking, 
with  complacent  vanity,  that  his  own  skull  would  look  well  on 
top  of  the  heap  and  his  own  ribs  add  a  charm  to  the  frescoes 
which  possibly  they  lacked  at  present. 

Here  and  there,  in  ornamental  alcoves  stretched  upon  beds 
of  bones,  lay  dead  and  dried-up  monks,  with  lank  frames 
dressed  in  the  black  robes  one  sees  ordinarily  upon  priests.  We 
examined  one  closely.  The  skinny  hands  were  clasped  upon 
the  breast;  two  lusterless  tufts  of  hair  stuck  to  the  skull;  the 
skin  was  brown  and  shrunken;  it  stretched  tightly  over  the 
cheek-bones  and  made  them  stand  out  sharply;  the  crisp  dead 
eyes  were  deep  in  the  sockets;  the  nostrils  were  painfully 
prominent,  the  end  of  the  nose  being  gone;  the  lips  had 
shriveled  away  from  the  yellow  teeth ;  and  brought  down  to  us 
through  the  circling  years,  and  petrified  there,  was  a  weird 
laugh  a  full  century  old ! 

It  was  the  j oiliest  laugh,  but  yet  the  most  dreadful,  that  one 
can  imagine.  Surely,  I  thought,  it  must  have  been  a  most 


208 


MARK  TWAIN 


extraordinary  joke  this  veteran  produced  with  his  latest  breath, 
that  he  has  not  got  done  laughing  at  it  yet.  At  this  moment 
I  saw  that  the  old  instinct  was  strong  upon  the  boys,  and  I  said 
we  had  better  hurry  to  St.  Peter's.  They  were  trying  to  keep 
from  asking,  "Is — is  he  dead?" 

It  makes  me  dizzy  to  thing  of  the  Vatican — of  its  wilderness 
of  statues,  paintings,  and  curiosities  of  every  description  and 
every  age.  The  "old  masters"  (especially  in  sculpture)  fairly 
swarm,  there.  I  cannot  write  about  the  Vatican.  I  think  I 
shall  never  remember  anything  I  saw  there  distinctly  but  the 
mummies,  and  the  "Transfiguration,"  by  Raphael,  and  some 
other  things  it  is  not  necessary  to  mention  now.  I  shall  re 
member  the  "Transfiguration"  partly  because  it  was  placed  in 
a  room  almost  by  itself ;  partly  because  it  is  acknowledged  by 
all  to  be  the  first  oil-painting  in  the  world ;  and  partly  because 
it  was  wonderfully  beautiful.  The  colors  are  fresh  and  rich, 
the  "expression,"  I  am  told,  is  fine,  the  "feeling"  is  lively,  the 
"tone"  is  good,  the  "depth"  is  profound,  and  the  width  is  about 
four  and  a  half  feet,  I  should  judge.  It  is  a  picture  that  really 
holds  one's  attention;  its  beauty  is  fascinating.  It  is  fine 
enough  to  be  a  Renaissance.  A  remark  I  made  a  while  ago 
suggests  a  thought — and  a  hope.  Is  it  not  possible  that  the  rea 
son  I  find  such  charms  in  this  picture  is  because  it  is  out  of  the 
crazy  chaos  of  the  galleries?  If  some  of  the  others  were  set 
apart,  might  not  they  be  beautiful?  If  this  were  set  in  the 
midst  of  the  tempest  of  pictures  one  finds  in  the  vast  galleries 
of  the  Roman  palaces,  would  I  think  it  so  handsome?  If,  up 
to  this  time,  I  had  seen  only  one  "old  master"  in  each  palace, 
instead  of  acres  and  acres  of  walls  and  ceilings  fairly  papered 
with  them,  might  I  not  have  a  more  civilized  opinion  of  the  old 
masters  than  I  have  now  ?  I  think  so.  When  I  was  a  school 
boy  and  was  to  have  a  new  knife,  I  could  not  make  up  my  mind 
as  to  which  was  the  prettiest  in  the  showcase,  and  I  did  not 
think  any  of  them  were  particularly  pretty;  and  so  I  chose 
with  a  heavy  heart.  But  when  I  looked  at  my  purchase,  at 
home,  where  no  glittering  blades  came  into  competition  with  it, 
I  was  astonished  to  see  how  handsome  it  was.  To  this  day  my 
new  hats  look  better  out  of  the  shop  than  they  did  in  it  with 
other  new  hats.  It  begins  to  dawn  upon  me,  now,  that  possibly, 
what  I  have  been  taking  for  uniform  ugliness  in  the  galleries 
may  be  uniform  beauty  after  all.  I  honestly  hope  it  is,  to 
others,  but  certainly  it  is  not  to  me.  Perhaps  the  reason  I  used 
to  enjoy  going  to  the  Academy  of  Fine  Arts  in  New  York 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  209 

was  because  there  were  but  a  few  hundred  paintings  in  it,  and 
it  did  not  surfeit  me  to  go  through  the  list.  I  suppose  the 
Academy  was  bacon  and  beans  in  the  Forty-Mile  Desert,  and 
a  European  gallery  is  a  state  dinner  of  thirteen  courses.  One 
leaves  no  sign  after  him  of  the  one  dish,  but  the  thirteen 
frighten  away  his  appetite  and  give  him  no  satisfaction. 

There  is  one  thing  I  am  certain  of,  though.  With  all  the 
Michael  Angelos,  the  Raphaels,  the  Guidos,  and  the  other  old 
masters,  the  sublime  history  of  Rome  remains  unpainted! 
They  painted  Virgins  enough,  and  Popes  enough,  and  saintly 
scarecrows  enough,  to  people  Paradise,  almost,  and  these  things 
are  all  they  did  paint.  "Nero  fiddling  o'er  burning  Rome,"  the 
assassination  of  Caesar,  the  stirring  spectacle  of  a  hundred 
thousand  people  bending  forward  with  rapt  interest,  in  the 
Coliseum,  to  see  two  skilful  gladiators  hacking  away  each 
other's  life,  a  tiger  springing  upon  a  kneeling  martyr — these  and 
a  thousand  other  matters  which  we  read  of  with  a  living  in 
terest,  must  be  sought  for  only  in  books — not  among  the  rubbish 
left  by  the  old  masters — who  are  no  more,  I  have  the  satisfac 
tion  of  infoming  the  public. 

They  did  paint,  and  they  did  carve  in  marble,  one  historical 
scene,  and  one  only  (of  any  great  historical  consequence). 
And  what  was  it  and  why  did  they  choose  it,  particularly? 
It  was  the  Rape  of  the  Sabines,  and  they  chose  it  for  the  legs 
and  busts. 

I  like  to  look  at  statues,  however,  and  I  like  to  look  at  pic 
tures,  also — even  of  monks  looking  up  in  sacred  ecstasy,  and 
monks  looking  down  in  meditation,  and  monks  skirmishing  for 
something  to  eat —  and  therefore  I  drop  ill  nature  to  thank 
the  papal  government  for  so  jealously  guarding  and  so  indus 
triously  gathering  up  these  things;  and  for  permitting  me,  a 
stranger  and  not  an  entirely  friendly  one,  to  roam  at  will  and 
unmolested  among  them,  charging  me  nothing,  and  only  re 
quiring  that  I  shall  behave  myself  simply  as  well  as  I  ought  to 
behave  in  any  other  man's  house.  I  thank  the  Holy  Father 
right  heartily,  and  I  wish  him  long  life  and  plenty  of  happiness. 

The  Popes  have  long  been  the  patrons  and  preservers  of  art, 
just  as  our  new,  practical  Republic  is  the  encourager  and  up 
holder  of  mechanics.  In  their  Vatican  is  stored  up  all  that  is 
curious  and  beautiful  in  art ;  in  our  Patent  Office  is  hoarded 
all  that  is  curious  or  useful  in  mechanics.  When  a  man  in 
vents  a  new  style  of  horse-collar  or  discovers  a  new  and 
superior  method  of  telegraphing,  our  government  issues  a 


210  MARK  TWAIN 

patent  to  him  that  is  worth  a  fortune ;  when  a  man  digs  up  an 
ancient  statue  in  the  Campagna,  the  Pope  gives  him  a  fortune 
in  gold  coin.  We  can  make  something  of  a  guess  at  a  man's 
character  by  the  style  of  nose  he  carries  on  his  face.  The  Vati 
can  and  the  Patent  Office  are  governmental  noses,  and  they  bear 
a  deal  of  character  about  them. 

The  guide  showed  us  a  colossal  statue  of  Jupiter,  in  the  Vati 
can,  which  he  said  looked  so  damaged  and  rusty — so  like  the 
God  of  the  Vagabonds — because  it  had  but  recently  been  dug 
up  in  the  Campagna.  He  asked  how  much  we  supposed  this 
Jupiter  was  worth.  I  replied,  with  intelligent  promptness,  that 
he  was  probably  worth  about  four  dollars — maybe  four  and  a 
half.  "A  hundred  thousand  dollars !"  Ferguson  said.  Fer 
guson  said,  further,  that  the  Pope  permits  no  ancient  work  of 
this  kind  to  leave  his  dominions.  He  appoints  a  commission  to 
examine  discoveries  like  this  and  report  upon  the  value;  then 
the  Pope  pays  the  discoverer  one-half  of  that  assessed  value 
and  takes  the  statue.  He  said  this  Jupiter  was  dug  from  a  field 
which  had  just  been  bought  for  thirty-six  thousand  dollars,  so 
the  first  crop  was  a  good  one  for  the  new  farmer.  I  do  not 
know  whether  Ferguson  always  tells  the  truth  or  not,  but  1 
suppose  he  does.  I  know  that  an  exorbitant  export  duty  is  ex 
acted  upon  all  pictures  painted  by  the  old  masters,  in  order  to 
discourage  the  sale  of  those  in  the  private  collections.  I  am 
satisfied,  also,  that  genuine  old  masters  hardly  exist  at  all,  in 
America,  because  the  cheapest  and  most  insignificant  of  them 
are  valued  at  the  price  of  a  fine  farm.  I  proposed  to  buy  a 
small  trifle  of  a  Raphael,  myself,  but  the  price  of  it  was  eighty 
thousand  dollars,  the  export  duty  would  have  made  it  con 
siderably  over  a  hundred,  and  so  I  studied  on  it  awhile  and 
concluded  not  to  take  it. 

I  wish  here  to  mention  an  inscription  I  have  seen,  before  I 
forget  it: 

"Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  peace  on  earth  TO  MEN  OF 
GOOD  WILL  !"  It  is  not  good  Scripture,  but  it  is  sound  Catholic 
and  human  nature. 

Phis  is  in  letters  of  gold  around  the  apsis  of  a  mosaic  group 
at  the  side  of  the  scala  santa,  church  of  St  John  Lateran,  the 
Mother  and  Mistress  of  all  the  Catholic  churches  of  the  world. 
The  group  represents  the  Saviour,  St.  Peter,  Pope  Leo,  St. 
Silvester,  Constantine,  and '  Charlemagne.  Peter  is  giving  the 
pallium  to  the  Pope,  and  a  standard  to  Charlemagne.  The 
Saviour  is  giving  the  keys  to  St.  Silvester,  and  a  standard  to 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  211 

Constantine.  No  prayer  is  offered  to  the  Saviour,  who  seems 
to  be  of  litttle  importance  anywhere  in  Rome;  but  an  inscrip 
tion  below  says,  ''Blessed  Peter,  give  life  to  Pope  Leo  and 
victory  to  King  diaries."  It  does  not  say,  "Intercede  for  us, 
through  the  Saviour,  with  the  Father,  for  this  boon/'  but 
"Blessed  Peter,  give  it  us." 

In  all  seriousness — without  meaning  to  be  frivolous — with 
out  meaning  to  be  irreverent,  and  more  than  all,  without  mean 
ing  to  be  blasphemous, — I  state  as  my  simple  deduction  from 
the  things  I  have  seen  and  the  things  I  have  heard,  that  the 
Holy  Personages  rank  thus  in  Rome : 

First — "The  Mother  of  God" — otherwise  the  Virgin  Mary. 

Second — The  Deity. 

Third— Peter. 

Fourth — Some  twelve  or  fifteen  canonized  Popes  and 
martyrs. 

Fifth — Jesus  Christ  the  Saviour — (but  always  as  an  infant 
in  arms). 

I  may  be  wrong  in  this — my  judgment  errs  often,  just  as  is 
the  case  with  other  men's — but  it  is  my  judgment,  be  it  good 
or  bad. 

Just  here  I  will  mention  something  that  seems  curious  to  me. 
There  are  no  "Christ's  Churches"  in  Rome,  and  no  "Churches 
of  the  Holy  Ghost,"  that  I  can  discover.  There  are  some  four 
hundred  churches,  but  about  a  fourth  of  them  seem  to  be  named 
for  the  Madonna  and  St.  Peter.  There  are  so  many  named  for 
Mary  that  they  have  to  be  distinguished  by  all  sorts  of  affixes, 
if  I  understand  the  matter  rightly.  Then  we  have  churches  of 
St.  Louis;  St.  Augustine;  St.  Agnes;  St.  Calixtus;  St.  Lor 
enzo  in  Lucina;  St.  Lorenzo  in  Damaso;  St.  Cecilia;  St. 
Athanasius;  St.  Philip  Neri;  St.  Catherine;  St.  Domenico, 
and  a  multitude  of  lesser  saints  whose  names  are  not  familiar 
in  the  world — and  away  down,  clear  out  of  the  list  of  the 
churches,  comes  a  couple  of  hospitals:  one  of  them  is  named 
forthe  Saviour  and  the  other  for  the  Holy  Ghost ! 

fljay  after  day  and  night  after  night  we  have  wandered 
among  the  crumbling  wonders  of  Rome;  day  after  day  and 
night  after  night  we  have  fed  upon  the  dust  and  decay  of  five- 
and-twenty  centuries — have  brooded  over  them  by  day  and 
dreamt  of  them  by  night  till  sometimes  we  seemed  moldering 
away  ourselves,  and  growing  defaced  and  cornerless,  and  li 
able  at  any  moment  to  fall  a  prey  to  some  antiquary  and  be 
patched  in  the  legs,  and  "restored"  with  an  unseemly  nose,  and 


212  MARK  TWAIN 

labeled  wrong  and  dated  wrong,  and  set  up  in  the  Vatican  for 
poets  to  drivel  about  and  vandals  to  scribble  their  names  on 
forever  and  f orevermore. 

But  the  surest  way  to  stop  writing  about  Rome  is  to  stop.  I 
wished  to  write  a  real  "guide-book"  chapter  on  this  fascinating 
city,  but  I  could  not  do  it,  because  I  have  felt  all  the  time  like 
a  boy  in  a  candy  shop — there  was  everything  to  choose  from, 
and  yet  no  choice.  I  have  drifted  along  hopelessly  for  a  hun 
dred  pages  of  manuscript  without  knowing  where  to  commence. 
I  will  not  commence  at  all.  Our  passports  have  been  examined. 
We  will  go  to  Naples. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

THE  ship  is  lying  here  in  the  harbor  of  Naples — quar 
antined.  She  has  been  here  several  days  and  will  re 
main  several  more.  We  that  came  by  rail  from  Rome 
have  escaped  this  misfortune.  Of  course  no  one  is  allowed 
to  go  on  board  the  ship,  or  come  ashore  from  her.  She  is  a 
prison,  now.  The  passengers  probably  spend  the  long,  blaz 
ing  days  looking  out  from  under  the  awnings  at  Vesuvius  and 
the  beautiful  city — and  in  swearing.  Think  of  ten  days  of 
this  sort  of  pastime ! — We  go  out  every  day  in  a  boat  and  re 
quest  them  to  come  ashore.  It  soothes  them.  We  lie  ten  steps 
from  the  ship  and  tell  them  how  splendid  the  city  is ;  and  how 
much  better  the  hotel  fare  is  here  than  anywhere  else  in 
Europe ;  and  how  cool  it  is ;  and  what  frozen  continents  of  ice 
cream  there  are;  and  what  a  time  we  are  having  cavorting 
about  the  country  and  sailing  to  the  islands  in  the  Bay.  This 
tranquilizes  them. 

ASCENT    OF    VESUVIUS 

I  shall  remember  our  trip  to  Vesuvius  for  many  a  day — 
partly  because  of  its  sight-seeing  experiences,  but  chiefly  on 
account  of  the  fatigue  of  the  journey.  Two  or  three  of  us  had 
been  resting  ourselves  among  the  tranquil  and  beautiful  scenery 
of  the  island  of  Ischia,  eighteen  miles  out  in  the  harbor,  for 
two  days ;  we  called  it  "resting/*  but  I  do  not  remember  now 
what  the  resting  consisted  of,  for  when  we  got  back  to  Naples 
we  had  not  slept  for  forty-eight  hours.  We  were  just  about 
to  go  to  bed  early  in  the  evening,  and  catch  up  on  some  of  the 
sleep  we  had  lost,  when  we  heard  of  this  Vesuvius  expedition. 
There  were  to  be  eight  of  us  in  the  party,  and  we  were  to  leave 
Naples  at  midnight.  We  laid  in  some  provisions  for  the  trip, 
engaged  carriages  to  take  us  to  Annunciation,  and  then  moved 
about  the  city,  to  keep  awake,  till  twelve.  We  got  away  punc 
tually,  and  in  the  course  of  an  hour  and  a  half  arrived  at  the 
town  of  Annunciation.  Annunciation  is  the  very  last  place 
under  the  sun.  In  other  towns  in  Italy,  the  people  lie  around 
quietly  and  wait  for  you  to  ask  them  a  question  or  do  some 

213 


2H  MARK  TWAIN 

overt  act  that  can  be  charged  for— but  in  Annunciation  they 
have  lost  even  that  fragment  of  delicacy;  they  seize  a  lady's 
shawl  from  a  chair  and  hand  it  to  her  and  charge  a  penny; 
they  open  a  carriage  door,  and  charge  for  it— shut  it  when  you 
get  out,  and  charge  for  it ;  they  help  you  to  take  off  a  duster- 
two  cents ;  brush  your  clothes  and  make  them  worse  than  they 
were  before — two  cents;  smile  upon  you — two  cents;  bow, 
with  a  lickspittle  smirk,  hat  in  hand — two  cents ;  they  volunteer 
all  information,  such  as  that  the  mules  will  arrive  presently— 
two  cents — warm  day,  sir — two  cents — takes  you  four  hours 
to  make  the  ascent — two  cents.  And  so  they  go.  They  crowd 
you — infest  you — swarm  about  you,  and  sweat  and  smell  offen 
sively,  and  look  sneaking  and  mean,  and  obsequious.  There  is 
no  office^too  degrading  for  them  to  perform,  for  money.  I  have, 
had  no  opportunity  to  find  out  anything  about  the  upper  classes 
by  my  own  observation,  but  from  what  I  hear  said  about  them  I 
judge  that  what  they  lack  in  one  or  two  of  the  bad  traits  the 
canaille  have  they  make  up  in  one  or  two  others  that  are  worse. 
How  the  people  beg! — many  of  them  very  well  dressed,  too. 
I  said  I  knew  nothing  against  the  upper  classes  by  personal 
observation.  I  must  recall  it!  I  had  forgotten.  What  I  saw 
their  bravest  and  their  fairest  do  last  night,  the  lowest  multi 
tude  that  could  be  scraped  up  out  of  the  purlieus  of  Christen 
dom  would  blush  to  do,  I  think.  They  assembled  by  hundreds, 
and  even  thousands,  in  the  great  Theater  of  San  Carlo,  to  do 
— what?  Why,  simply,  to  make  fun  of  an  old  woman — to 
deride,  to  hiss,  to  jeer  at  an  actress  they  once  worshiped,  but 
whose  beauty  is  faded  now  and  whose  voice  has  lost  its  former 
richness.  Everybody  spoke  of  the  rare  sport  there  was  to  be. 
They  said  the  theater  would  be  crammed,  because  Frezzolini 
was  going  to  sing.  It  was  said  she  could  not  sing  well,  now, 
but  then  the  people  liked  to  see  her,  anyhow.  And  so  we  went. ? 
And  every  time  the  woman  sang  they  hissed  and  laughed — 
the  whole  magnificent  house — and  as  soon  as  she  left  the  stage 
they  called  her  on  again  with  applause.  Once  or  twice  she  was 
encored  five  and  six  times  in  succession,  and  received  with 
hisses  when  she  appeared,  and  discharged  with  hisses  and 
laughter  when  she  had  finished — then  instantly  encored  and  in 
sulted  again!  And  how  the  high-born  knaves  enjoyed  it! 
White-kidded  gentlemen  and  ladies  laughed  till  the  tears  came, 
and  clapped  their  hands  in  very  ecstasy  when  that  unhappy  old 
woman  would  come  meekly  out  for  the  sixth  time,  with  un 
complaining  patience,  to  meet  a  storm  of  hisses!  It  was  the 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  215 

crudest  exhibition — the  most  wanton,  the  most  unfeeling.  The 
singer  would  have  conquered  an  audience  of  American  rowdies 
by  her  brave,  unflinching  tranquillity  (for  she  answered  encore 
after  encore,  and  smiled  and  bowed  pleasantly,  and  sang  the  best 
she  possibly  could,  and  went  bowing  off,  through  all  the  jeers 
and  hisses,  without  ever  losing  countenance  or  temper)  :  and 
surely  in  any  other  land  than  Italy  her  sex  and  her  helplessness 
must  have  been  an  ample  protection  to  her — she  could  have 
needed  no  other.  Think  what  a  multitude  of  small  souls  were 
crowded  into  that  theater  last  night.  If  the  manager  could 
have  filled  his  theater  with  Neapolitan  souls  alone,  without  the 
bodies,  he  could  not  have  cleared  less  than  ninety  millions  of 
dollars.  What  traits  of  character  must  a  man  have  to  enable 
him  to  help  three  thousand  miscreants  to  hiss,  and  jeer,  and 
laugh  at  one  friendless  old  woman,  and  shamefully  humiliate 
her?  He  must  have  all  the  vile,  mean  traits  there  are.  My 
observation  persuades  me  (I  do  not  like  to  venture  beyond  my 
own  personal  observation)  that  the  upper  classes  of  Naples 
possess  those  traits  of  character.  Otherwise  they  may  be  very 
good  people;  I  cannot  say. 

ASCENT  OF  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

In  this  city  of  Naples,  they  believe  in  and  support  one  of 
the  wretchedest  of  all  the  religious  impostures  one  can  find  in 
Italy — the  miraculous  liquefaction  of  the  blood  of  St.  Januarius. 
Twice  a  year  the  priests  assemble  all  the  people  at  the  Cathe 
dral,  and  get  out  this  vial  of  clotted  blood  and  let  them  see  it 
slowly  dissolve  and  become  liquid— and  every  day  for  eight  days 
this  dismal  farce  is  repeated  while  the  priests  go  among  the 
crowd  and  collect  money  for  the  exhibition.  The  first  day,  the 
blood  liquefies  in  forty-seven  minutes — the  church  is  crammed, 
then,  and  time  must  be  allowed  the  collectors  to  get  around : 
after  that  it  liquefies  a  little  quicker  and  a  little  quicker,  every 
day,  as  the  houses  grow  smaller,  till  on  the  eighth  day,  with  only 
a  few  dozen  present  to  see  the  miracle,  it  liquefies  in  four  min 
utes. 

And  here,  also,  they  used  to  have  a  grand  procession,  of 
priests,  citizens,  soldiers,  sailors,  and  the  high  dignitaries  of 
the  City  Government,  once  a  year,  to  shave  the  head  of  a  made- 
up  Madonna — a  stuffed  and  painted  image,  like  a  milliner's 
dummy — whose  hair  miraculously  grew  and  restored  itself 
every  twelve  months.  They  still  kept  up  this  shaving  pro- 


216  MARK  TWAIN 

cession  as  late  as  four  or  five  years  ago.  It  was  a  source  of 
great  profit  to  the  church  that  possessed  the  remarkable  effigy, 
and  the  ceremony  of  the  public  bartering  of  her  was  always 
carried  out  with  the  greatest  possible  eclat  and  display — the 
more  the  better,  because  the  more  excitement  there  was  about 
it  the  larger  the  crowd  it  drew  and  the  heavier  the  revenues  it 
produced — but  at  last  a  day  came  when  the  Pope  and  his  ser 
vants  were  unpopular  in  Naples,  and  the  City  Government 
stopped  the  Madonna's  annual  show. 

There  we  have  two  specimens  of  these  Neapolitans — two  of 
the  silliest  possible  frauds,  which  half  the  population  religiously 
and  faithfully  believed,  and  the  other  half  either  believed  also 
or  else  said  nothing  about,  and  thus  lent  themselves  to  the  sup 
port  of  the  imposture.  I  am  very  well  satisfied  to  think  the 
whole  population  believed  in  those  poor,  cheap  miracles — a 
people  who  want  two  cents  every  time  they  bow  to  you,  and 
who  abuse  a  woman,  are  capable  of  it,  I  think. 


ASCENT    OF    VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

These  Neapolitans  always  ask  four  times  as  much  money  as 
they  intend  to  take,  but  if  you  give  them  what  they  first  de 
mand,  they  feel  ashamed  of  themselves  for  aiming  so  low,  and 
immediately  ask  more.  When  money  is  to  be  paid  and  re 
ceived,  there  is  always  some  vehement  jawing  and  gesticulating 
about  it.  One  cannot  buy  and  pay  for  two  cents'  worth  of 
clams  without  trouble  and  a  quarrel.  One  "course,"  in  a  two- 
horse  carriage,  costs  a  franc — that  is  law — but  the  hackman 
always  demands  more,  on  some  pretense  or  other,  and  if  he 
gets  it  he  makes  a  new  demand.  It  is  said  that  a  stranger  took 
a  one-horse  carriage  for  a  course — tariff,  half  a  franc.  He  gave 
the  man  five'  francs,  by  way  of  experiment.  He  demanded 
more,  and  received  another  franc.  Again  he  demanded  more, 
and  got  a  franc — demanded  more,  and  it  was  refused.  He  grew 
vehement — was  again  refused,  and  became  noisy.  The  stranger 
said,  "Well,  give  me  the  seven  francs  again,  and  I  will  see 
what  I  can  do" — and  when  he  got  them,  he  handed  the  hack 
man  half  a  franc,  and  he  immediately  asked  for  two  cents  to 
buy  a  drink  with.  It  may  be  thought  that  I  am  prejudiced. 
Perhaps  I  am.  I  would  be  ashamed  of  myself  if  I  were  not. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  217 

ASCENT    OF    VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

Well,  as  I  was  saying,  we  got  our  mules  and  horses,  after 
an  hour  and  a  half  of  bargaining  with  the  population  of  An 
nunciation,  and  started  sleepily  up  the  mountain,  with  a  vagrant 
at  each  mule's  tail  who  pretended  to  be  driving  the  brute  along, 
but  was  really  holding  on  and  getting  himself  dragged  up  in 
stead.  I  made  slow  headway  at  first,  but  I  began  to  get  dis 
satisfied  at  the  idea  of  paying  my  minion  five  francs  to  hold  my 
mule  back  by  the  tail  and  keep  him  from  going  up  the  hill,  and 
so  I  discharged  him. 

We  had  one  magnificent  picture  of  Naples  from  a  high 
point  on  the  mountainside.  We  saw  nothing  but  the  gas- 
lamps,  of  course — two-thirds  of  a  circle,  skirting  the  great 
Bay — a  necklace  of  diamonds  glinting  up  through  the  dark 
ness  from  the  remote  distance — less  brilliant  than  the  stars 
^overhead,  but  more  softly,  richly  beautiful — and  over  all  the 
great  city  the  lights  crossed  and  recrossed  each  other  in  many 
and  many  a  sparkling  line  and  curve.  And  back  of  the  town, 
far  around  and  abroad  over  the  miles  of  level  campagna,  were 
scattered  rows,  and  circles,  and  clusters  of  lights,  all  glowing 
like  so  many  gems,  and  marking  where  a  score  of  villages  were 
sleeping.  About  this  time,  the  fellow  who  was  hanging  on  to 
the  tail  of  the  horse  in  front  of  me  and  practising  all  sorts  of 
unnecessary  cruelty  upon  the  animal,  got  kicked  some  fourteen 
rods,  and  this  incident,  together  with  the  fairy  spectacle  of  the 
lights  far  in  the  distance,  made  me  serenely  happy,  and  I  was 
glad  I  started  to  Vesuvius. 

ASCENT   OF   MOUNT  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

This  subject  will  be  excellent  matter  for  a  chapter,  and  to 
morrow  or  next  day  I  will  write  it. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

ASCENT  OF  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

SEE  Naples  and  die."  Well,  I  do  not  know  that  one 
would  necessarily  die  after  merely  seeing  it,  but  to 
attempt  to  live  there  might  turn  out  a  little  dfferently. 
To  see  Naples  as  we  saw  it  in  the  early  dawn  from  far  up 
on  the  side  of  Vesuvius,  is  to  see  a  picture  of  wonderful 
beauty.  At  that  distance  its  dingy  buildings  looked  white — 
and  so,  rank  on  rank  of  balconies,  windows,  and  roofs,  they 
piled  themselves  up  from  the  blue  ocean  till  the  colossal  castle 
of  St.  Elmo  topped  the  grand  white  pyramid  and  gave  the 
picture  symmetry,  emphasis,  and  completeness.  And  when 
its  lilies  turned  to  roses — when  it  blushed  under  the  sun's 
first  kiss — it  was  beautiful  beyond  all  description.  One  might 
well  say,  then,  "See  Naples  and  die."  The  frame  of  the 
picture  was  charming,  itself.  In  front,  the  smooth  sea — a 
vast  mosaic  of  many  colors;  the  lofty  island  swimming  in  a 
dreamy  haze  in  the  distance;  at  our  end  of  the  city  the  stately- 
double  peak  of  Vesuvius,  and  its  strong  black  ribs  and  seams 
of  lava  stretching  down  to  the  limitless  level  campagna — a 
green  carpet  that  enchants  the  eye  and  leads  it  on  and  on, 
past  clusters  of  trees,  and  isolated  houses,  and  snowy  villages, 
until  it  shreds  out  in  a  fringe  of  mist  and  general  vagueness 
far  away.  It  is  from  the  Hermitage,  there  on  the  side  of 
Vesuvius,  that  one  should  "see  Naples  and  die." 

But  do  not  go  within  the  walls  and  look  at  it  in  detail.  ' 
That  takes  away  some  of  the  romance  of  the  thing.  The 
people  are  filthy  in  their  habits,  and  this  makes  filthy  streets 
and  breeds  disagreeable  sights  and  smells.  There  never  was 
a  community  so  prejudiced  against  the  cholera  as  these  Neapol 
itans  are.  But  they  have  good  reason  to  be.  The  cholera 
generally  vanquishes  a  Neapolitan  when  it  seizes  him,  because, 
you  understand,  before  the  doctor  can  dig  through  the  dirt 
and  get  at  the  disease  the  man  dies.  The  upper  classes  take 
a  sea-bath  every  day,  and  are  pretty  decent. 

The  streets  are  generally  about  wide  enough  for  one  wagon, 

218 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  219 

and  how  they  do  swarm  with  people !  It  is  Broadway  re 
peated  in  every  street,  in  every  court,  in  every  alley !  Such 
masses,  such  throngs,  such  multitudes  of  hurrying,  bustling, 
struggling  humanity !  We  never  saw  the  like  of  it,  hardly 
even  in  New  York,  I  think.  There  are  seldom  any  sidewalks, 
and  when  there  are,  they  are  not  often  wide  enough  to  pass 
a  man  on  without  caroming  on  him.  So  everybody  walks  in 
the  street — and  where  the  street  is  wide  enough,  carriages  are 
forever  dashing  along.  Why  a  thousand  people  are  not 
run  over  and  crippled  every  day  is  a  mystery  that  no  man 
can  solve. 

But  if  there  is  an  eighth  wonder  in  the  world,  it  must 
be  the  dwelling-houses  of  Naples.  I  honestly  believe  a  good 
majority  of  them  are  a  hundred  feet  high!  And  the  solid 
brick  walls  are  seven  feet  through.  You  go  up  nine  flights  of 
stairs  before  you  get  to  the  "first"  floor.  No,  not  nine,  but 
there  or  thereabouts.  There  is  a  little  bird-cage  of  an  iron 
railing  in  front  of  every  window  clear  away  up,  up,  up,  among 
the  eternal  clouds,  where  the  roof  is,  and  there  is  always  some 
body  looking  out  of  every  window — people  of  ordinary  size 
looking  out  from  the  first  floor,  people  a  shade  smaller  from 
the  second,  people  that  look  a  little  smaller  yet  from  the  third 
— and  from  thence  upward  they  grow  smaller  and  smaller  by 
a  regularly  graduated  diminution,  till  the  folks  in  the  topmost 
windows  seem  more  like  birds  in  an  uncommonly  tall  martin- 
box  than  anything  else.  The  perspective  of  one  of  these 
narrow  cracks  of  streets,  with  its  rows  of  tall  houses  stretching 
away  till  they  come  together  in  the  distance  like  railway- 
tracks;  its  clothes-lines  crossing  over  at  all  altitudes  and 
waving  their  bannered  raggedness  over  the  swarms  of  people 
below;  and  the  white-dressed  women  perched  in  balcony  rail 
ings  all  the  way  from  the  pavement  up  to  the  heavens — a  per 
spective  like  that  is  really  worth  going  into  Neapolitan  details 
to  see. 

ASCENT  OF  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

Naples,  with  its  immediate  suburbs,  contains  six  hundred 
and  twenty-five  thousand  inhabitants,  but  I  am  satisfied  it 
covers  no  more  ground  than  an  American  city  of  one  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand.  It  reaches  up  into  the  air  infinitely  higher 
than  three  American  cities,  though,  and  there  is  where  the 
secret  of  it  lies.  I  will  observe  here,  in  passing,  that  the  con- 


220  MARK  TWAIN 

trasts  between  opulence  and  poverty,  and  magnificence  and 
misery,  are  more  frequent  and  more  striking  in  Naples  than 
in  Paris  even.  One  must  go  to  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  to  see 
fashionable  dressing,  splendid  equipages,  and  stunning  liveries, 
and  to  the  Faubourg  St.  Antoine  to  see  vice,  misery,  hunger, 
rags,  dirt— but  in  the  thoroughfares  of  Naples  these  things  are 
all  mixed  together.  Naked  boys  of  nine  years  and  the  fancy- 
dressed  children  of  luxury;  shreds  and  tatters,  and  brilliant 
uniforms;  jackass  carts  and  state  carriages;  beggars,  princes, 
and  bishops,  jostle  each  other  in  every  street.  At  six  o'clock 
every  evening,  all  Naples  turns  out  to  drive  on  the  Riviera  di 
Chiaja  (whatever  that  may  mean)  ;  and  for  two  hours  one 
may  stand  there  and  see  the  motliest  and  the  worst-mixed 
procession  go  by  that  ever  eyes  beheld.  Princes  (there  are 
more  princes  than  policemen  in  Naples — the  city  is  infested 
with  them) — princes  who  live  up  seven  flights  of  stairs  and 
don't  own  any  principalities,  will  keep  a  carriage  and  go 
hungry;  and  clerks,  mechanics,  milliners,  and  strumpets  will  go 
without  their  dinners  and  squander  the  money  on  a  hack-ride 
in  the  Chiaja ;  the  ragtag  and  rubbish  of  the  city  stack  them 
selves  up,  to  the  number  of  twenty  or  thirty,  on  a  rickety  little 
go-cart  hauled  by  a  donkey  not  much  bigger  than  a  cat,  and 
they  drive  in  the  Chiaja;  dukes  and  bankers,  in  sumptuous 
carriages  and  with  gorgeous  drivers  and  footmen,  turn  out, 
also,  and  so  the  furious  procession  goes.  For  two  hours  rank 
and  wealth,  and  obscurity  and  poverty,  clatter  along  side  by 
side  in  the  wild  procession,  and  then  go  home  serene,  happy, 
covered  with  glory ! 

I  was  looking  at  a  magnificent  marble  staircase  in  the 
King's  palace,  the  other  day,  which,  it  was  said,  cost  five 
million  francs,  and  I  suppose  it  did  cost  half  a  million,  maybe,  j 
I  felt  as  if  it  must  be  a  fine  thing  to  live  in  a  country  where 
there  was  such  comfort  and  such  luxury  as  this.  And  then  I 
stepped  out  musing,  and  almost  walked  over  a  vagabond  who 
was  eating  his  dinner  on  the  curbstone — a  piece  of  bread 
and  a  bunch  of  grapes.  When  I  found  that  this  mustang  was 
clerking  in  a  fruit  establishment  (he  had  the  establishment 
along  with  him  in  a  basket),  at  two  cents  a  day,  and  that  he 
had  no  palace  at  home  where  he  lived.  I  lost  some  of  my 
enthusiasm  concerning  the  happiness  of  living  in  Italy. 

This  naturally  suggests  to  me  a  thought  about  wages  here. 
Lieutenants  in  the  army  get  about  a  dollar  a  day,  and  common 
soldiers  get  a  couple  of  cents.  I  only  know  one  clerk — he 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  221 

gets  four  dollars  a  month.  Printers  get  six  dollars  and  a  half 
a  month,  but  I  have  heard  of  a  foreman  who  gets  thirteen. 
To  be  growing  suddenly  and  violently  rich,  as  this  man  is, 
naturally  makes  him  a  bloated  aristocrat.  The  airs  he  puts  on 
are  insufferable. 

And,  speaking  of  wages,  reminds  me  of  prices  of  merchan 
dise.  In  Paris  you  pay  twelve  dollars  a  dozen  for  Jouvin's 
best  kid  gloves;  gloves  of  about  as  good  quality  sell  here  at 
three  or  four  dollars  a  dozen.  You  pay  five  and  six  dollars 
apiece  for  fine  linen  shirts  in  Paris;  here  and  in  Leghorn  you 
pay  two  and  a  half.  In  Marseilles  you  pay  forty  dollars  for 
a  first-class  dress-coat  made  by  a  good  tailor,  but  in  Leghorn 
you  can  get  a  full-dress  suit  for  the  same  money.  Here  you 
get  handsome  business  suits  at  from  ten  to  twenty  dollars,  and 
in  Leghorn  you  can  get  an  overcoat  for  fifteen  dollars  that 
would  cost  you  seventy  in  New  York.  Fine  kid  boots  are 
worth  eight  dollars  in  Marseilles  and  four  dollars  here.  Lyons 
velvets  rank  higher  in  America  than  those  of  Genoa.  Yet  the 
bulk  of  Lyons  velvets  you  buy  in  the  States  are  made  in 
Genoa  and  imported  into  Lyons,  where  they  receive  the  Lyons 
stamp  and  are  then  exported  to  America.  You  can  buy  enough 
velvet  in  Genoa  for  twenty-five  dollars  to  make  a  five-hundred- 
dollar  cloak  in  New  York — so  the  ladies  tell  me.  Of  course, 
these  things  bring  me  back,  by  a  natural  and  easy  transition, 
to  the 

ASCENT  OF  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

And  thus  the  wonderful  Blue  Grotto  is  suggested  to  me.  It 
is  situated  on  the  island  of  Capri,  twenty-two  miles  from 
Naples.  We  chartered  a  little  steamer  and  went  out  there. 
Of  course,  the  police  boarded  us  and  put  us  through  a  health 
examination,  and  inquired  into  our  politics,  before  they  would 
let  us  land.  The  airs  these  little  insect  governments  put  on 
are  in  the  last  degree  ridiculous.  They  even  put  a  policeman 
on  board  our  boat  to  keep  an  eye  on  us  as  long  as  we  were  in 
the  Capri  dominions.  They  thought  we  wanted  to  steal  the 
grotto,  I  suppose.  It  was  worth  stealing.  The  entrance  to  the 
cave  is  four  feet  high  and  four  feet  wide,  and  is  in  the 
face  of  a  lofty  perpendicular  cliff — the  sea-wall.  You  enter 
in  small  boats — and  a  tight  squeeze  it  is,  too.  You  cannot 
go  in  at  all  when  the  tide  is  up.  Once  within,  you  find  your 
self  in  an  arched  cavern  about  one  hundred  and  sixty  feet 


222  MARK  TWAIN 

long,  one  hundred  and  twenty  wide,  and  about  seventy  high. 
How  deep  it  is  no  man  knows.  It  goes  down  to  the  bottom 
of  the  ocean.  The  waters  of  this  placid  subterranean  lake 
are  the  brightest,  loveliest  blue  that  can  be  imagined.  They 
are  as  transparent  as  plate-glass,  and  their  coloring  would 
shame  the  richest  sky  that  ever  bent  over  Italy.  No  tint  could 
be  more  ravishing,  no  luster  more  superb.  Throw  a  stone 
into  the  water,  and  the  myriad  of  tiny  bubbles  that  are 
created  flash  out  a  brilliant  glare  like  blue  theatrical  fires.  Dip 
an  oar,  and  its  blade  turns  to  splendid  frosted  silver,  tinted 
with  blue.  Let  a  man  jump  in,  and  instantly  he  is  cased  in 
an  armor  more  gorgeous  than  every  kingly  Crusader  wore. 

Then  we  went  to  Ischia,  but  I  had  already  been  to  that 
island  and  tired  myself  to  death  "resting"  a  couple  of  days  and 
studying  human  villainy,  with  the  landlord  of  the  Grande 
Sentinelle  for  a  model.  So  we  went  to  Procida,  and  from 
thence  to  Pozzuoli,  where  St.  Paul  landed  after  he  sailed  from 
Samos.  I  landed  at  precisely  the  same  spot  where  St.  Paul 
landed,  and  so  did  Dan  and  the  others.  It  was  a  remarkable 
coincidence.  St.  Paul  preached  to  these  people  seven  days 
before  he  started  to  Rome. 

Nero's  Baths,  the  ruins  of  Baise,  the  Temple  of  Serapis: 
Cumae,  where  the  Cumaean  Sibyl  interpreted  the  oracles,  the 
Lake  Agnano,  with  its  ancient  submerged  city  still  visible 
far  down  in  its  depths — these  and  a  hundred  other  points  of 
interest  we  examined  with  critical  imbecility,  but  the  Grotto 
of  the  Dog  claimed  our  chief  attention,  because  we  had  heard 
and  read  so  much  about  it.  Everybody  has  written  about 
the  Grotto  del  Cane  and  its  poisonous  vapors,  from  Pliny 
down  to  Smith,  and  every  tourist  has  held  a  dog  over  its 
floor  by  the  legs  to  test  the  capabilities  of  the  place.  The  I 
dog  dies  in  a  minute  and  a  half— a  chicken  instantly.  As  a 
general  thing,  strangers  who  crawl  in  there  to  sleep  do  not 
get  up  until  they  are  called.  And  then  they  don't,  either. 
The  stranger  that  ventures  to  sleep  there  takes  a  permanent- 
contract.  [  longed  to  see  this  grotto.  I  resolved  to  take  a 
dog  and  hold  him  myself ;  suffocate  him  a  little,  and  time  him ; 
suffocate  him  some  more,  and  then  finish  him.  We  reached 
the  grotto  about  three  in  the  afternoon,  and  proceeded  at  once 
to  make  the  experiments.  But  now,  an  important  difficulty 
presented  itself.  We  had  no  dog 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  223 

ASCENT  OF  VESUVIUS CONTINUED 

At  the  Hermitage  we  were  about  fifteen  or  eighteen  hun 
dred  feet  above  the  sea,  and  thus  far  a  portion  of  the  ascent 
had  been  pretty  abrupt.  For  the  next  two  miles  the  road  was 
a  mixture — sometimes  the  ascent  was  abrupt  and  sometimes 
it  was  not;  but  one  characteristic  it  possessed  all  the  time, 
without  failure — without  modification — it  was  all  uncompro 
misingly  and  unspeakably  infamous.  It  was  a  rough,  narrow 
trail,  and  led  over  an  old  lava-flow — a  black  ocean  which  was 
tumbled  into  a  thousand  fantastic  shapes —  wild  chaos  of 
ruin,  desolation,  and  barrenness — a  wilderness  of  billowy  up 
heavals,  of  furious  whirlpools,  of  miniature  mountains  rent 
asunder — of  gnarled  and  knotted,  wrinkled  and  twisted  masses 
of  blackness  that  mimicked  branching  roots,  great  vines,  trunks 
of  trees,  all  interlaced  and  mingled  together;  and  all  these 
•vveird  shapes,  all  this  turbulent  panorama,  all  this  stormy,  far- 
stretching  waste  of  blackness,  with  its  thrilling  suggestive- 
ness  of  life,  of  action,  of  boiling,  surging,  furious  motion,  was 
petrified ! — all  stricken  dead  and  cold  in  the  instant  of  its 
maddest  rioting! — fettered,  paralyzed,  and  left  to  glower  at 
heaven  in  impotent  rage  forevermore! 

Finally  we  stood  in  a  level,  narrow  valley  (a  valley  that 
had  been  created  by  the  terrific  march  of  some  old-time  erup 
tion)  and  on  either  hand  towered  the  two  steep  peaks  of 
Vesuvius.  The  one  we  had  to  climb — the  one  that  contains 
the  active  volcano — seemed  about  eight  hundred  or  one  thou 
sand  feet  high,  and  looked  almost  too  straight-up-and-down 
for  any  man  to  climb,  and  certainly  no  mule  could  climb  it 
with  a  man  on  his  back.  Four  of  these  native  pirates  will 
carry  you  to  the  top  in  a  sedan-chair,  if  you  wish  it,  but  sup 
pose  they  were  to  slip  and  let  you  fall, — is  it  likely  that  you 
would  ever  stop  rolling?  Not  this  side  of  eternity,  perhaps. 
We  left  the  mules,  sharpened  our  finger-nails,  and  began  the 
ascent  I  have  been  writing  about  so  long,  at  twenty  minutes 
to  six  in  the  morning.  The  path  led  straight  up  a  rugged 
sweep  of  loose  chunks  of  pumice-stone,  and  for  about  every 
two  steps  forward  we  took,  we  slid  back  one.  It  was  so  ex 
cessively  steep  that  we  had  to  stop,  every  fifty  or  sixty  steps, 
and  rest  a  moment.  To  see  our  comrades,  we  had  to  look 
very  nearly  straight  up  at  those  above  us,  and  very  nearly 
straight  down  at  those  below.  We  stood  on  the  summit  at 
last — it  had  taken  an  hour  and  fifteen  minutes  to  make  the  trip. 


224  MARK  TWAIN 

What  we  saw  there  was  simply  a  circular  crater— a  cir 
cular  ditch,  if  you  please— about  two  hundred  feet  deep, 
and  four  or  five  hundred  feet  wide,  whose  inner  wall  was 
about  half  a  mile  in  circumference.  In  the  center  of  the 
great  circus-ring  thus  formed  was  a  torn  and  ragged  upheaval 
a  hundred  feet  high,  all  snowed  over  with  a  sulphur  crust  of 
many  and  many  a  brilliant  and  beautiful  color,  and  the  ditch 
inclosed  this  like  the  moat  of  a  castle,  or  surrounded  it  as  a 
little  river  does  a  little  island,  if  the  simile  is  gaudy  in  the 
extreme — all  mingled  together  in  the  richest  confusion  were 
red,  brown,  black,  yellow,  white — I  do  not  know  that  there  was 
a  color,  or  shade  of  a  color,  or  combination  of  colors,  un 
represented — and  when  the  sun  burst  through  the  morning 
mists  and  fired  this  tinted  magnificence,  it  topped  imperial 
Vesuvius  like  a  jeweled  crown! 

The  crater  itself — the  ditch — was  not  so  variegated  in  color 
ing,  but  yet,  in  its  softness,  richness,  and  unpretentious  ele 
gance,  it  was  more  charming,  more  fascinating  to  the  eye. 
There  was  nothing  "loud"  about  its  well-bred  and  well-dressed 
look.  Beautiful?  One  could  stand  and  look  down  upon  it 
for  a  week  without  getting  tired  of  it.  It  had  the  semblance 
of  a  pleasant  meadow,  whose  slender  grasses  and  whose  vel 
vety  mosses  were  frosted  with  a  shining  dust,  and  tinted  with 
palest  green  that  deepened  gradually  to  the  darkest  hue  of 
the  orange  leaf,  and  deepened  yet  again  into  gravest  brown, 
then  faded  into  orange,  then  into  brightest  gold,  and  culminated 
in  the  delicate  pink  of  a  new-blown  rose.  Where  portions  of 
the  meadow  had  sunk,  and  where  other  portions  had  been 
broken  up  like  an  ice-floe,  the  cavernous  openings  of  the  one, 
and  the  ragged  upturned  edges  exposed  by  the  other,  were 
hung  with  a  lacework  of  soft-tinted  crystals  of  sulphur  that 
changed  their  deformities  into  quaint  shapes  and  figures  that 
were  full  of  grace  and  beauty. 

The  walls  of  the  ditch  were  brilliant  with  yellow  banks  of 
sulphur  and  with  lava  and  pumice-stone  of  many  colors.  No 
fire  was  visible  anywhere,  but  gusts  of  sulphurous  steam 
issued  silently  and  invisibly  from  a  thousand  little  cracks  and 
fissures  in  the  crater,  and  were  wafted  to  our  noses  with 
every  breeze.  But  so  long  as  we  kept  our  nostrils  buried  in 
our  handkerchiefs,  there  was  small  danger  of  suffocation. 

Some  of  the  boys  thrust  long  slips  of  paper  down  into 
holes  and  set  them  on  fire,  and  so  achieved  the  glory  of  lighting 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  225 

their  cigars  by  the  flames  of  Vesuvius,  and  others  cooked  eggs 
over  fissures  in  the  rocks  and  were  happy. 

The  view  from  the  summit  would  have  been  superb  but 
for  the  fact  that  the  sun  could  only  pierce  the  mists  at  long 
intervals.  Thus  the  glimpses  we  had  of  the  grand  panorama 
below  were  only  fitful  and  unsatisfactory. 

THE   DESCENT 

The  descent  of  the  mountain  was  a  labor  of  only  four 
minutes.  Instead  of  stalking-  down  the  rugged  path  we 
ascended,  we  chose  one  which  was  bedded  knee-deep  in  loose 
ashes,  and  plowed  our  way  with  prodigious  strides  that  would 
almost  have  shamed  the  performance  of  him  of  the  seven- 
league  boots. 

The  Vesuvius  of  to-day  is  a  very  poor  affair  compared 
to  the  mighty  volcano  of  Kilauea,  in  the  Sandwich  Islands, 
but  I  am  glad  I  visited  it.  It  was  well  worth  it. 

It  is  said  that  during  one  of  the  grand  eruptions  of  Ve 
suvius  it  discharged  massive  rocks  weighing  many  tons  a 
thousand  feet  into  the  air,  its  vast  jets  of  smoke  and  steam 
ascended  thirty  miles  toward  the  firmament,  and  clouds  of  its 
ashes  were  wafted  abroad  and  fell  upon  the  decks  of  ships 
seven  hundred  and  fifty  miles  at  sea!  I  will  take  the  ashes 
at  a  moderate  distance,  if  any  pne  will  take  the  thirty  miles 
of  smoke,  but  I  do  not  feel  able  to  take  a  commanding  interest 
in  the  whole  story  by  myself. 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

THE   BURIED    CITY    OF    POMPEII 

THEY  pronounce  it  Pom-pay-e.  I  always  had  an  idea 
that  you  went  down  into  Pompeii  with  torches,  by  the 
way  of  damp,  dark  stairways,  just  as  you  do  in  silver- 
mines,  and  traversed  gloomy  tunnels  with  lava  overhead  and 
something  on  either  hand  like  dilapidated  prisons  gouged  out 
of  the  solid  earth,  that  faintly  resembled  houses,  But  you  do 
nothing  of  the  kind.  Fully  one-half  of  the  buried  city,  per 
haps,  is  completely  exhumed  and  thrown  open  freely  to  the 
light  of  day;  and  there  stand  the  long  rows  of  solidly  built 
brick  houses  (roofless)  just  as  they  stood  eighteen  hundred 
years  ago,  hot  with  the  flaming  sun;  and  there  lie  their 
floors,  clean-swept,  and  not  a  bright  fragment  tarnished  or 
wanting  of  the  labored  mosaics  that  pictured  them  with  the 
beasts  and  birds  and  flowers  which  we  copy  in  perishable  car 
pets  to-day;  and  there  are  the  Venuses  and  Bachuses  and 
Adonises,  making  love  and  getting  drunk  in  many-hued 
frescoes  on  the  walls  of  saloon  and  bedchamber ;  and  there 
are  the  narrow  streets  and  narrower  sidewalks,  paved  with 
flags  of  good  hard  lava,  the  one  deeply  rutted  with  the 
chariot-wheels,  and  the  other  with  the  passing  feet  of  the 
Pompeiians  of  bygone  centuries ;  and  there  are  the  bake  shops, 
the  temples,  the  halls  of  justice,  the  baths,  the  theaters — all 
clean-scraped  and  neat,  and  suggesting  nothing  of  the  nature 
of  a  silver-mine  away  down  in  the  bowels  of  the  earth.  The 
broken  pillars  lying  about,  the  doorless  doorways,  and  the 
crumbled  tops  of  the  wilderness  of  walls,  were  wonderfully 
suggestive  of  the  "burnt  district"  in  one  of  our  cities,  and 
if  there  had  been  any  charred  timbers,  shattered  windows, 
heaps  of  debris,  and  general  blackness  and  smokiness  about  the 
place,  the  resemblance  would  have  been  perfect.  But  no — the 
sun  shines  as  brightly  down  on  old  Pompeii  to-day  as  it  did 
when  Christ  was  born  in  Bethlehem,  and  its  streets  are  cleaner 
a  hundred  times  than  ever  Pompeiian  saw  them  in  her  prime. 
I  know  whereof  I  speak — for  in  the  great,  chief  thorough- 

226 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  227 

fares  (Merchant  Street  and  the  Street  of  Fortune)  have  I  not 
seen  with  my  own  eyes  how  for  two  hundred  years  at  least 
the  pavements  were  not  repaired ! — how  ruts  five  and  even  ten 
inches  deep  were  worn  into  the  thick  flagstones  by  the  chariot- 
wheels  of  generations  of  swindled  taxpayers?  And  do  I  not 
know  by  these  signs  that  street  commissioners  of  Pompeii 
never  attended  to  their  business,  and  that  if  they  never  mended 
the  pavements  they  never  cleaned  them?  And,  besides,  is 
it  not  the  inborn  nature  of  street  commissioners  to  avoid  their 
duty  whenever  they  get  a  chance?  I  wish  I  knew  the  name 
of  the  last  one  that  held  office  in  Pompeii  so  that  I  could 
give  him  a  blast.  I  speak  with  feeling  on  this  subject,  be 
cause  I  caught  my  foot  in  one  of  these  ruts,  and  the  sadness 
that  came  over  me  when  I  saw  the  first  poor  skeleton,  with 
ashes  and  lava  sticking  to  it,  was  tempered  by  the  reflection 
thatjmaybe  that  party  was  the  street  commissioner. 

fNo — Pompeii  is  no  longer  a  buried  city.     It  is  a  city  of  /, 
hundreds  and  hundreds  of  roofless  houses,  and  a  tangled  maze  \l 
of  streets  where  one  could  easily  get  lost,  without  a  guide,  \\ 
and  have  to  sleep  in  some  ghostly  palace  that  had  known  no  IV 
living  tenant  since  that  awful   November  night  of   eighteen   \\ 
centuries  ag67) 

We  passed  through  the  gate  which  faces  the  Mediterranean 
(called  the  "Marine  Gate"),  and  by  the  rusty,  broken  image 
of  Minerva,  still  keeping  tireless  watch  and  ward  over  the 
possessions  it  was  powerless  to  save,  and  went  up  a  long 
street  and  stood  in  the  broad  court  of  the  Forum  of  Justice. 
The  floor  was  level  and  clean,  and  up  and  down  either  side 
was  a  noble  colonnade  of  broken  pillars,  with  their  beautiful 
Ionic  and  Corinthian  columns  scattered  about  them.  At  the 
upper  end  were  the  vacant  seats  of  the  judges,  and  behind 
them  we  descended  into  a  dungeon  where  the  ashes  and 
cinders  had  found  two  prisoners  chained  on  that  memorable 
November  night,  and  tortured  them  to  death.  How  they  must 
have  tugged  at  the  pitiless  fetters  as  the  fierce  fires  surged 
around  them! 

Then  we  lounged  through  many  and  many  a  sumptuous 
private  mansion  which  we  could  not  have  entered  without 
a  formal  invitation  in  incomprehensible  Latin,  in  the  olden 
time,  when  the  owners  lived  there — and  we  probably  wouldn't 
have  got  it.  These  people  built  their  houses  a  good  deal  alike. 
The  floors  were  laid  in  fanciful  figures  wrought  in  mosaics 
of  many-colored  marbles.  At  the  threshold  your  eyes  fall 


228  MARK  TWAIN 

upon  a  Latin  sentence  of  welcome,  sometimes,  or  a  picture 
of  a  dog,  with  the  legend,  "Beware  of  the  Dog,"  and  some 
times  a  picture  of  a  bear  or  a  faun  with  no  inscription  at  all. 
Then  you  enter  a  sort  of  vestibule,  where  they  used  to  keep 
the  hat-rack,  I  suppose;  next  a  room  with  a  large  marble 
basin  in  the  midst  and  the  pipes  of  a  fountain;  on  either 
side  are  bedrooms;  beyond  the  fountain  is  a  reception-room, 
then  a  little  garden  dining-room,  and  so  forth  and  so  on. 
The  floors  were  all  mosaic,  the  walls  were  stuccoed,  or  frescoed, 
or  ornamented  with  bas-reliefs,  and  here  and  there  were 
statues,  large  and  small,  and  little  fish-pools,  and  cascades  of 
sparkling  water  that  sprang  from  secret  places  in  the  colonnade 
of  handsome  pillars  that  surrounded  the  court,  and  kept  the 
flower-beds  fresh  and  the  air  cool.  Those  Pompeiians  were 
very  luxurious  in  their  tastes  and  habits.  The  most  exquisite 
bronzes  we  have  seen  in  Europe  came  from  the  exhumed 
cities  of  Herculaneum  and  Pompeii,  and  also  the  finest  cameos 
and  the  most  delicate  engravings  on  precious  stones;  their 
pictures,  eighteen  or  nineteen  centuries  old,  are  often  much 
more  pleasing  than  the  celebrated  rubbish  of  the  old  masters 
of  three  centuries  ago.  They  were  well  up  in  art.  From 
the  creation  of  these  works  of  the  first,  clear  up  to  the 
eleventh  century,  art  seems  hardly  to  have  existed  at  all— 
at  least  no  remnants  of  it  are  left — and  it  was  curious  to  see 
how  far  (in  some  things,  at  any  rate)  these  old-time  pagans 
excelled  the  remote  generations  of  masters  that  came  after 
them.  The  pride  of  the  world  in  sculptures  seem  to  be  the 
Laocoon  and  the  Dying  Gladiator  in  Rome.  They  are  as 
old^  as  Pompeii,  were  dug  from  the  earth  like  Pompeii ;  but 
their  exact  age  or  who  made  them  can  only  be  conjectured. 
But  worn  and  cracked,  without  a  hjistory,  and  with  the 
blemishing  stains  of  numberless  centuries  upon  them,  they  still 
mutely  mock  at  all  efforts  to  rival  their  perfections. 

It  was  a  quaint  and  curious  pastime,  wandering  through  this 
old  silent  city  of  the  dead — lounging  through  utterly  deserted 
streets  where  thousands  and  thousands  of  human  beings  once 
bought  and  sold,  and  walked  and  rode,  and  made  the  place 
resound  with  the  noise  and  confusion  of  traffic  and  pleasure. 
They  were  not  lazy.  They  hurried  in  those  days.  We  had 
evidence  of  that.  There  was  a  temple  on  one  corner,  and  it 
was  a  shorter  cut  to  go  between  the  columns  of  that  temple 
from  one  street  to  the  other  than  to  go  around— and  behold, 
that  pathway  had  been  worn  deep  into  the  heavy  flagstone 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  229 

floor  of  the  building  by  generations  of  time-saving  feet! 
They  would  not  go  around  when  it  was  quicker  to  go  through. 
We  do  that  way  in  our  cities. 

Everywhere,  you  see  things  that  make  you  wonder  how 
old  these  old  houses  were  before  the  night  of  destruction 
came — things,  too,  which  bring  back  those  long-dead  inhab 
itants  and  place  them  living  before  your  eyes.  For  instance : 
The  steps  (two  feet  thick — lava  blocks)  that  lead  up  out  of 
the  school,  and  the  same  kind  of  steps  that  lead  up  into 
the  dress-circle  of  the  principal  theater,  are  almost  worn 
through!  For  ages  the  boys  hurried  out  of  that  school,  and 
for  ages  their  parents  hurried  into  that  theater,  and  the 
nervous  feet  that  have  been  dust  and  ashes  for  eighteen  cen 
turies  have  left  their  record  for  us  to  read  to-day.  I  imagined 
I  could  see  crowds  of  gentlemen  and  ladies  thronging  into 
the  theater,  with  tickets  for  secured  seats  in  their  hands, 
and  on  the  wall,  I  read  the  imaginary  placard,  in  infamous 
grammar,  "POSITIVELY  No  FREE  LIST,  EXCEPT  MEMBERS  OF 
THE  PRESS!"  Hanging  about  the  doorway  (I  fancied)  were 
slouchy  Pompeiian  street-boys  uttering  slang  and  profanity, 
and  keeping  a  wary  eye  out  for  checks.  I  entered  the  theater, 
and  sat  down  in  one  of  the  long  rows  of  stone  benches  in  the 
dress-circle,  and  looked  at  the  place  for  the  orchestra,  and 
the  ruined  stage,  and  around  at  the  wide  sweep  of  empty 
boxes,  and  thought  to  myself,  "This  house  won't  pay."  I 
tried  to  imagine  the  music  in  full  blast,  the  leader  of  the 
orchestra  beating  time,  and  the  "versatile"  So-and-so  (who 
had  "just  returned  from  a  most  successful  tour  in  the  prov 
inces  to  play  his  last  and  farewell  engagement  of  positively 
•six  nights  only,  in  Pompeii,  previous  to  his  departure  for 
Herculaneum" )  charging  around  the  stage  and  piling  the 
agony  mountain  high — but  I  could  not  do  it  with  such  a 
"house"  as  that;  those  empty  benches  tied  my  fancy  down 
to  full  reality.  I  said,  these  people  that  ought  to  be  here  have 
been  dead,  and  still,  and  moldering  to  dust  for  ages  and  ages, 
and  will  never  care  for  the  trifles  and  follies  of  life  any  more 
forever — "Owing  to  circumstances,  etc.,  etc.,  there  will  not 
be  any  performance  to-night."  Close  down  the  curtain.  Put 
out  the  lights. 

And  so  I  turned  away  and  went  through  shop  after  shop 
and  store  after  store,  far  down  the  long  street  of  the  mer 
chants,  and  called  for  the  wares  of  Rome  and  the  East,  but 
the  tradesmen  were  gone,  the  marts  were  silent,  and  nothing 


230  MARK  TWAIN 

was  left  but  the  broken  jars  all  set  in  cement  of  cinders  and 
ashes;  the  wine  and  the  oil  that  once  had  filled  them  were 
gone  with  their  owners. 

3  In  a  bake  shop  was  a  mill  for  grinding  the  grain,  and  the 
furnaces  for  baking  the  bread ;  and  they  say  that  here,  in  the 
same  furnaces,  the  exhumers  of  Pompeii  found  nice,  well- 
baked  loaves  which  the  baker  had  not  found  time  to  remove 
from  the  ovens  the  last  time  he  left  his  shop,  because  circum 
stances  compelled  him  to  leave  in  such  a  hurry. 

In  one  house  (the  only  building  in  Pompeii  which  no  wo 
man  is  now  allowed  to  enter)  were  the  small  rooms  and  short 
beds  of  solid  masonry,  just  as  they  were  in  the  old  times,  and 
on  the  walls  were  pictures  which  looked  almost  as  fresh  as  if 
they  were  painted  yesterday,  but  which  no  pen  could  have  the 
hardihood  to  describe;  and  here  and  there  were  Latin  in 
scriptions — obscene  scintillations  of  wit,  scratched  by  hands 
that  possibly  were  uplifted  to  Heaven  for  succor  in  the  midst 
of  a  driving  storm  of  fire  before  the  night  was  done. 

In  one  of  the  principal  streets  was  a  ponderous  stone  tank, 
and  a  water-spout  that  supplied  it,  and  where  the  tired,  heated 
toilers  from  the  Campagna  used  to  rest  their  right  hands  when 
they  bent  over  to  put  their  lips  to  the  spout,  the  thick  stone 
was  worn  down  to  a  broad  groove  an  inch  or  two  deep.  Think 
of  the  countless  thousands  of  hands  that  had  pressed  that  spot 
in  the  ages  that  are  gone,  to  so  reduce  a  stone  that  is  as  hard 
as  iron! 

They  had  a  great  public  bulletin-board  in  Pompeii — a  place 
where  announcements  for  gladiatorial  combats,  elections,  and 
such  things,  were  posted — not  on  perishable  paper,  but  carved 
in  enduring  stone.  One  lady,  who,  I  take  it,  was  rich  and  well 
brought  up,  advertised  a  dwelling  or  so  to  rent,  with  baths 
and  all  the  modern  improvements,  and  several  hundred  shops, 
stipulating  that  the  dwellings  should  not  be  put  to  immoral 
purposes.  You  can  find  out  who  lived  in  many  a  house  in 
Pompeii  by  the  carved  stone  door-plates  affixed  to  them: 
and  in  the  same  way  you  can  tell  who  they  were  that  occupy 
the  tombs.  Everywhere  around  are  things  that  reveal  to  you 
something  of  the  customs  and  history  of  this  forgotten  people. 
But  what  would  a  volcano  leave  of  an  American  city,  if  it 
once  rained  its  cinders  on  it  ?  Hardly  a  sign  or  a  symbol  to  tell 
its  story. 

In  one  of  these  long  Pompeiian  halls  the  skeleton  of  a  man 
was  found,  with  ten  pieces  of  gold  in  one  hand  and  a  large 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  231 

key  in  the  other.  He  had  seized  his  money  and  started  toward 
the  door,  but  the  fiery  tempest  caught  him  at  the  very  thresh 
old,  and  he  sank  down  and  died.  One  more  mimtte  of  precious 
time  would  have  saved  him.  I  saw  the  skeletons  of  a  man,  a 
woman,  and  two  young  girls.  The  woman  had  her  hands 
spread  wide  apart,  as  if  in  mortal  terror,  and  I  imagined  I 
could  still  trace  upon  her  shapeless  face  something  of  the 
expression  of  wild  despair  that  distorted  it  when  the  heavens 
rained  fire  in  these  streets,  so  many  ages  ago.  The  girls  and 
the  man  lay  with  their  faces  upon  their  arms,  as  if  they  had 
tried  to  shield  them  from  the  enveloping  cinders.  In  one 
apartment  eighteen  skeletons  were  found,  all  in  sitting  pos 
tures,  and  blackened  places  on  the  walls  still  mark  their  shapes 
and  show  their  attitudes,  like  shadows.  One  of  them,  a  wo 
man,  still  wore  upon  her  skeleton  throat  a  necklace,  with  her 
name  engraved  upon  it — JULIE  DI  DIOMEDE. 

But  perhaps  the  most  poetical  thing  Pompeii  has  yielded 
to  modern  research,  was  that  grand  figure  of  a  Roman  soldier, 
clad  in  complete  armor ;  who,  true  to  his  duty,  true  to  his  proud 
name  of  a  soldier  of  Rome,  and  full  of  the  stern  courage  which 
had  given  to  that  name  its  glory,  stood  to  his  post  by  the  city 
gate,  erect  and  unflinching,  till  the  hell  that  raged  around  him 
burned  out  the  dauntless  spirit  it  could  not  conquer. 

We  never  read  of  Pompeii  but  we  think  of  that  soldier; 
we  cannot  write  of  Pompeii  without  the  natural  impulse  to 
grant  to  him  the  mention  he  so  well  deserves.  Let  us  remember 
that  he  was  a  soldier — not  a  policeman — and  so,  praise  him. 
Being  a  soldier,  he  stayed — because  the  warrior  instinct  for 
bade  him  to  fly.  Had  he  been  a  policeman  he  would  have 
stayed,  also — because  he  would  have  been  asleep. 

There  are  not  half  a  dozen  flights  of  stairs  in  Pompeii,  and 
no  other  evidences  that  the  houses  were  more  than  one  story 
high.  The  people  did  not  live  in  the  clouds,  as  do  the  Vene 
tians,  the  Genoese  and  Neapolitans  of  to-day. 

We  came  out  from  under  the  solemn  mysteries  of  this  city 
of  the  Venerable  Past — this  city  which  perished,  with  all  its 
old  ways  and  its  quaint  old  fashions  about  it,  remote  centuries 
ago,  when  the  Disciples  were  preaching  the  new  religion,  which 
is  as  old  as  the  hills  to  us  now — and  went  dreaming  among 
the  trees  that  grow  over  acres  and  acres  of  its  still  buried 
streets  and  squares,  till  a  shrill  whistle  and  the  cry  of  "All 
aboard — last  train  for  Naples!"  woke  me  up  and  reminded 
me  that  I  belonged  in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  was  not  a 


232  MARK  TWAIN 

dusty  dummy,  caked  with  ashes  and  cinders,  eighteen  hun 
dred  years  old.  The  transition  was  startling.  The  idea  of  a 
railroad-train  actually  running  to  old  dead  Pompeii,  and 
whistling  irreverently,  and  calling  for  passengers  in  the  most 
bustling  and  businesslike  way,  was  as  strange  a  thing  as  one 
could  imagine,  and  as  unpoetical  and  disagreeable  as  it:  was 
strange. 

Compare  the  cheerful  life  and  the  sunshine  of  this  day  with 
the  horrors  the  younger  Pliny  saw  here,  the  9th  of  November, 
A.D.  79,  when  he  was  so  bravely  striving  to  remove  his  mother 
out  of  reach  of  harm,  while  she  begged  him,  with  all  a 
mother's  unselfishness,  to  leave  her  to  perish  and  save  himself. 

By  this  time  the  murky  darkness  had  so  increased  that  one  might 
have  believed  himself  abroad  in  a  black  and  moonless  night,  or  in  a. 
chamber  where  all  the  lights  had  been  extinguished.  On  every  kind 
was  heard  the  complaints  of  women,  the  wailing  of  children,  and  the 
cries  of  men.  One  called  his  father,  another  his  son,  and  another  his 
wife,  and  only  by  their  voices  could  they  know  each  other.  Many  in 
their  despair  begged  that  death  would  come  and  end  their  distress. 

Some  implored  the  gods  to  succor  them,  and  some  believed  that  this 
night  was  the  last,  the  eternal  night  which  should  engulf  the  universe ! 

Even  so  it  seemed  to  me — and  I  consoled  myself  for  the  coming 
death  with  the  reflection :  BEHOLD  !  THE  WORLD  is  PASSING  AWAY  ! 

V^After  browsing  among  the  stately  ruins  of  Rome,  of  Baise, 
of  Pompeii,  and  after  glancing  down  the  long  marble  ranks  of 
battered  and  nameless  imperial  heads  that  stretch  down  the 
corridors  of  the  Vatican,  one  thing  strikes  rne  with  a  force  it 
never  had  before :  the  unsubstantial,  unlasting  character  of 
fame.  Men  lived  long  lives,  in  the  olden  time,  and  struggled 
feverishly  through  them,  toiling  like  slaves,  in  oratory,  in 
generalship,  or  in  literature,  aril  then  laid  them  down  and 
died,  happy  in  the  possession  of  an  enduring  history  and  a 
deathless  name.  Well,  twenty  little  centuries  flutter  away, 
and  what  is  l£ft  of  these  things?  A  crazy  inscription  on  a 
block  of  storae,  which  snuffy  antiquaries  bother  over  and  tangle 
up  and  make  nothing  out  of  but  a  bare  name  (which  they  spell 
wrong) — no  history,  no  tradition,  no  poetry — nothing  that  can 
give  it  even  a  passing  interest.  What  may  be  left  of  Gen 
eral  Grant's  great  name  forty  centuries  hence?  This — in  the 
Encyclopedia  for  A.D.  5868,  possibly?^ 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  233 

URIAH  S.  (or  Z.)  GRAUNT — popular  poet  of  ancient  times  in  the 
Aztec  provinces  of  the  United  States  of  British  America.  Some 
authors  say  flourished  about  A.D.  742;  but  the  learned  Ah-ah  Foo-foo 
states  that  he  was  a  contemporary  of  Scharkspyre,  the  English  poet,  and 
flourished  about  A.D.  1327,  some  three  centuries  after  the  Trojan 
war  instead  of  before  it.  He  wrote  "Rock  me  to  Sleep,  Mother." 

These  thoughts  sadden  me.     I  will  to  bed. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

HOME,   again!      For    the    first   time,   in   many    weeks, 
the  ship's  entire  family  met  and  shook  hands  on  the 
quarter-deck.     They  had  gathered  from  many  points 
of  the  compass  and  from  many  lands,  but  not  one  was  miss 
ing;  there  was  no  tale  of  sickness  or  death  among  the  flock 
to  dampen  the  pleasure  of   the   reunion.     Once  more   there 
was  a  full  audience  on  deck  to  listen  to  the  sailors*  chorus 
as  they  got  the  anchor  up,  and  to  wave  an  adieu  to  the  land 
as  we  sped  away  from  Naples. 

The  seats  were  full  at  dinner  again,  the  domino  parties 
were  complete,  and  the  life  and  bustle  on  the  upper  deck  in 
the  fine  moonlight  at  night  was  like  old  times — old  times  that 
had  been  gone  weeks  only,  but  yet  they  were  weeks  so  crowded 
with  incident,  adventure,  and  excitement,  that  they  seemed 
almost  like  years.  There  was  no  lack  of  cheerfulness  on 
board  the  Quaker  City.  For  once,  her  title  was  a  misnomer. 

At  seven  in  the  evening,  with  the  western  horizon  all  golden 
from  the  sunken  sun,  and  specked  with  distant  ships,  the  full 
moon  sailing  high  overhead,  the  dark  blue  of  the  sea  under 
foot,  and  a  strange  sort  of  twilight  affected  by  all  these  dif 
ferent  lights  and  colors  around  us  and  about  us,  we  sighted 
superb  Stromboli.  With  what  majesty  the  monarch  held  his 
lonely  state  above  the  level  sea!  Distance  clothed  him  in  a 
purple  gloom,  and  added  a  veil  of  shimmering  mist  that  so 
softened  his  rugged  features  that  we  seemed  to  see  him  through  ' 
a  web  of  silver  gauze.  His  torch  was  out;  his  fires  were 
smoldering;  a  tall  column  of  smoke  that  rose  up  and  lost  it 
self  in  the  growing  moonlight  was  all  the  sign  he  gave  that 
he  was  a  living  Autocrat  of  the  Sea  and  not  the  specter  of 
a  dead  one. 

^  At  two  in  the  morning  we  swept  through  the  Straits  of  Mes 
sina,  and  so  bright  was  the  moonlight  that  Italy  on  the  one 
hand  and  Sicily  on  the  other  seemed  almost  as  distinctly  visible 
as  though  we  looked  at  them  from  the  middle  of  a  street 
we  were  traversing.  The  city  of  Messina,  milk-like,  and 
starred  and  spangled  all  over  with  gaslights,  was  a  fairy 

234 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  235 

spectacle.  A  great  party  of  us  were  on  deck  smoking  and 
making  a  noise,  and  waiting  to  see  famous  Scylla  and  Charyb- 
dis.  And  presently  the  Oracle  stepped  out  with  his  eternal 
spy-glass  and  squared  himself  on  the  deck  like  another  Co 
lossus  of  Rhodes.  It  was  a  surprise  to  see  him  abroad  at  such 
an  hour.  Nobody  supposed  he  cared  anything  about  an  old 
fable  like  that  of  Scylla  and  Charybdis.  One  of  the  boys  said : 

"Hello,  doctor,  what  are  you  doing  up  here  at  this  time 
of  night? — What  do  you  want  to  see  this  place  for?" 

"What  do  /  want  to  see  this  place  for?  Young  man,  little 
do  you  know  me,  or  you  wouldn't  ask  such  a  question.  I 
wish  to  see  all  the  places  that's  mentioned  in  the  Bible." 

"Stuff!     This   place  isn't  mentioned  in  the   Bible." 

"It  ain't  mentioned  in  the  Bible! — this  place  ain't — well 
now,  what  place  is  this,  since  you  know  so  much  about  it?" 

"Why  it's   Scylla  and  Charybdis." 

"Scylla  and  Cha — confound  it,  I  thought  it  was  Sodom  and 
Gomorrah !" 

And  he  closed  up  his  glass  and  went  below.  The  above  is 
the  ship  story.  Its  plausibility  is  marred  a  little  by  the  fact 
that  the  Oracle  was  not  a  biblical  student,  and  did  not  spend 
much  of  his  time  instructing  himself  about  Scriptural  lo 
calities. — They  say  the  Oracle  complains,  in  this  hot  weather, 
lately,  that  the  only  beverage  in  the  ship  that  is  passable,  is 
the  butter.  He  did  not  mean  butter,  of  course,  but  inasmuch 
as  that  article  remains  in  a  melted  state  now  since  we  are 
out  of  ice,  it  is  fair  to  give  him  the  credit  of  getting  one  long 
word  in  the  right  place,  anyhow,  for  once  in  his  life.  He  said, 
in  Rome,  that  the  Pope  was  a  noble-looking  old  man,  but  he 
never  did  think  much  of  his  Iliad. 

\Ve  spent  one  pleasant  day  skirting  along  the  Isles  of 
Greece.  They  are  very  mountainous.  Their  prevailing  tints 
are  gray  and  brown,  approaching  to  red.  Little  white  villages, 
surrounded  by  trees,  nestle  in  the  valleys  or  roost  upon  the 
lofty  perpendicular  sea-walls. 

We  had  one  fine  sunset — a  rich  carmine  flush  that  suffused 
the  western  sky  and  cast  a  ruddy  glow  far  over  the  sea.  Fine 
sunsets  seem  to  be  rare  in  this  part  of  the  world — or  at  least, 
striking  ones.  They  are  soft,  sensuous,  lovely- — they  are  ex 
quisite,  refined,  effeminate,  but  we  have  seen  no  sunsets  here 
yet  like  the  gorgeous  conflagrations  that  flame  in  the  track  of 
the  sinking  sun  in  our  high  northern  latitudes. 

But  what  were  sunsets  to  us,  with  the  wild  excitement  upon 


236  MARK  TWAIN 

us  of  approaching  the  most  renowned  of  cities !  fWhat  cared 
we  for  outward  visions,  when  Agamemnon,  Achilles,  and  a 
thousand  other  heroes  of  the  great  Past  were  marching  in 
!  ghostly  procession  through  our  fancies  ?  What  were  sunsets 
to  us,  who  were  about  to  live  arid  breathe  and  walk  in  actual 
Athens;  yea,  and  go  far  down  into  the  dead  centuries  and 
bid  in  person  for  the  slaves,  Diogenes  and  Plato,  in  the 
public  market-place,  or  gossip  with  the  neighbors  about  the 
siege  of  Troy  or  the  splendid  deeds  of  Marathon  ?  W7e  scorned 
to  consider  sunsets^ 

We  arrived,  andentered  the  ancient  harbor  of  the  Piraeus  at 
last.  We  dropped  anchor  within  half  a  mile  of  the  village. 
Away  off,  across  the  undulating  Plain  of  Attica,  could  be  seen 
a  little  square-topped  hill  with  a  something  on  it,  which  our 
glasses  soon  discovered  to  be  the  ruined  edifices  of  the  citadel 
of  the  Athenians,  and  most  prominent  among  them  loomed  the 
venerable  Parthenon.  So  exquisitely  clear  and  pure  is  this 
wonderful  atmosphere  that  every  column  of  the  noble  struc 
ture  was  discernible  through  the  telescope,  and  even  the 
smaller  ruins  about  it  assumed  some  semblance  of  shape.  This 
at  a  distance  of  five  or  six  miles.  In  the  valley,  near  the 
Acropolis  (the  square-topped  hill  before  spoken  of),  Athens 
itself  could  be  vaguely  made  out  with  an  ordinary  lorgnette. 
Everybody  was  anxious  to  get  ashore  and  visit  these  classic 
localities  as  quickly  as  possible.  No  land  we  had  yet  seen  had 
aroused  such  universal  interest  among  the  passengers. 

But  bad  news  came.    The  commandant  of  the  Piraeus  came 
in  his  boat,  and  said  we  must  either  depart  or  else  get  outside 
the  harbor  and  remain  imprisoned  in  our  ship,  under  rigid 
quarantine,  for  eleven  days !     So  we  took  up  the  anchor  and 
moved  outside,  to  lie  a  dozen  hours  or  so,  taking  in  supplies, ; 
and  then  sail  for  Constantinople.     It  was  the  bitterest  disap- ' 
pointment  we  had  yet  experienced.    To  lie  a  whole  day  in  sight 
of  the  Acropolis,  and  yet  be  obliged  to  go  away  without  visit 
ing  Athens!      Disappointment   was   hardly  a   strong   enough 
word   to   describe   the   circumstances. 

All  hands  were  on  deck,  all  the  afternoon,  with  books  and 
maps  and  glasses,  trying  to  determine  which  "narrow  rocky 
ridge"  was  the  Areopagus,  which  sloping  hill  the  Pnyx,  which 
elevation  the  Museum  Hill,  and  so  on.  And  we  got  things 
confused.  Discussion  became  heated,  and  party  spirit  ran 
high.  Church-members  were  gazing  with  emotion  upon  a 
hill  which  they  said  was  the  one  St.  Paul  preached  from,  and 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  237 

another  faction  claimed  that  that  hill  was  Hymettus,  and 
another  that  it  was  Pentelicon !  After  all  the  trouble,  we  could 
be  certain  of  only  one  thing — the  square-topped  hill  was  the 
Acropolis,  and  the  grand  ruin  that  crowned  it  was  the  Parthe 
non,  whose  picture  we  knew  in  infancy  in  the  school-books. 

We  inquired  of  everybody  who  came  near  the  ship,  whether 
there  were  guards  in  the  Piraeus,  whether  they  were  strict, 
what  the  chances  were  of  capture  should  any  of  us  slip  ashore, 
and  in  case  any  of  us  made  the  venture  and  were  caught,  what 
would  be  probably  done  to  us?  The  answers  were  discour 
aging  :  There  was  a  strong  guard  or  police  force ;  the  Piraeus 
was  a  small  town,  and  any  stranger  seen  in  it  would  surely  at 
tract  attention — capture  would  be  certain.  The  commandant 
said  the  punishment  would  be  "heavy" ;  when  asked  "How 
heavy?"  he  said  it  would  be  "very  severe" — that  was  all  we 
could  get  out  of  him. 

At  eleven  o'clock  at  night,  when  most  of  the  ship's  com 
pany  were  abed,  four  of  us  stole  softly  ashore  in  a  small 
boat,  a  clouded  moon  favoring  the  enterprise,  and  started  two 
and  two,  and  far  apart,  over  a  low  hill,  intending  to  go  clear 
around  the  Piraeus,  out  of  the  range  of  its  police.  Picking 
our  way  so  stealthily  over  that  rocky,  nettle-grown  eminence, 
made  me  feel  a  good  deal  as  if  I  were  on  my  way  somewhere 
to  steal  something.  My  immediate  comrade  and  I  talked  in 
an  undertone  about  quarantine  laws  and  their  penalties,  but 
we  found  nothing  cheering  in  the  subject.  I  was  posted.  Only 
a  few  days  before,  I  was  talking  with  our  captain,  and  he 
mentioned  the  case  of  a  man  who  swam  ashore  from  a  quaran 
tined  ship  somewhere,  and  got  imprisoned  six  months  for  it; 
and  when  he  was  in  Genoa  a  few  years  ago,  a  captain  of  a 
quarantined  ship  went  in  his  boat  to  a  departing  ship,  which 
was  already  outside  of  the  harbor,  and  put  a  letter  on  board 
to  be  taken  to  his  family,  and  the  authorities  imprisoned  him 
three  months  for  it,  and  then  conducted  him  and  his  ship  fairly 
to  sea,  and  warned  him  never  to  show  himself  in  that  port 
again  while  he  lived.  This  kind  of  conversation  did  no  good, 
further  than  to  give  a  sort  of  dismal  interest  to  our  quaran 
tine-breaking  expedition,  and  so  we  dropped  it.  We  made 
the  entire  circuit  of  the  town  without  seeing  anybody  but 
one  man,  who  stared  at  us  curiously,  but  said  nothing,  and 
a  dozen  persons  asleep  on  the  ground  before  their  doors, 
whom  we  walked  among  and  never  woke — but  we  woke  up  dogs 
enough,  in  all  conscience — we  always  had  one  or  two  barking 


238  MARK  TWAIN 

at  our  heels,  and  several  times  we  had  as  many  as  ten 
and  twelve  at  once.  They  made  such  a  preposterous  dm  that 
persons  aboard  our  ship  said  they  could  tell  how  we  were 
progressing  for  a  long  time,  and  where  we  were,  by  the  bark 
ing  of  the  dogs.  The  clouded  moon  still  favored  us.  When 
we  had  made  the  whole  circuit,  and  were  passing  among  the 
houses  on  the  further  side  of  the  town,  the  moon  came  out 
splendidly,  but  we  no  longer  feared  the  light.  As  we  ap 
proached  a  well,  near  a  house,  to  get  a  drink,  the  owner  merely 
glanced  at  us  and  went  within.  He  left  the  quiet,  slumber 
ing  town  at  our  mercy.  I  record  it  here  proudly,  that  we 
didn't  do  anything  to  it. 

Seeing  no  road,  we  took  a  tall  hill  to  the  left^of  the  distant 
Acropolis  for  a  mark,  and  steered  straight  for  it  over  all  ob 
structions,  and  over  a  little  rougher  piece  of  country  than 
exists  anywhere  else  outside  of  the  state  of  Nevada,  perhaps. 
Part  of  the  way  it  was  covered  with  small,  loose  stones — we 
trod  on  six  at  a  time,  arid  they  all  rolled.  Another  part  of  it 
was  dry,  loose,  newly  plowed  ground.  Still  another  part  of  it 
was  a  long  stretch  of  low  grape  vines,  which  were  tanglesome 
and  troublesome,  and  which  we  took  to  be  brambles.  The 
Attic  Plain,  barring  the  grape  vines,  was  a  barren,  desolate, 
unpoetical  waste — I  wonder  what  it  was  in  Greece's  Age  of 
Glory,  five  hundred  years  before  Christ? 

In  the  neighborhood  of  one  o'clock  in  the  morning,  when 
we  were  heated  with  fast  walking  and  parched  with  thirst, 
Denny  exclaimed,  "Why,  these  weeds  are  grape  vines !"  and 
in  five  minutes  we  had  a  score  of  bunches  of  large,  white, 
delicious  grapes,  and  were  reaching  down  for  more  when 
a  dark  shape  rose  mysteriousily  up  out  of  the  shadows  be 
side  us  and  said  "Ho !"  And  so  we  left. 

In  ten  minutes  more  we  struck  into  a  beautiful  road,  and 
unlike  some  others  we  had  stumbled  upon  at  intervals,  it  led 
in  the  right  direction.  We  followed  it.  It  was  broad  and 
smooth  and  white — handsome  and  in  perfect  repair,  and 
shaded  on  both  sides  for  a  mile  or  so  with  single  ranks  of 
trees,  and  also  with  luxuriant  vineyards.  Twice  we  entered 
and  stole  grapes,  and  the  second  time  somebody  shouted  at 
us  from  some  invisible  place.  Whereupon  we  left  again. 
We  speculated  in  grapes  no  more  on  that  side  of  Athens. 

Shortly  we  came  upon  an  ancient  stone  aqueduct,  built 
upon  arches,  and  from  that  time  forth  we  had  ruins  all  about 
us — we  were  approaching  our  journey's  end.  We  could  not 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  239 

see  the  Acropolis  now  or  the  high  hill,  either,  and  I  wanted  to 
follow  the  road  till  we  were  abreast  of  them,  but  the  others 
overruled  me,  and  we  toiled  laboriously  up  the  stony  hill 
immediately  in  our  front — and  from  its  summit  saw  another 
— climbed  it  and  saw  another!  It  was  an  hour  of  exhausting- 
work.  Soon  we  came  upon  a  row  of  open  graves,  cut  in 
the  solid  rock — (for  while  one  of  them  served  Socrates 
for  a  prison) — we  passed  around  the  shoulder  of  the  hill, 
and  the  citadel,  in  all  its  ruined  magnificence,  burst  upon  us  I 
We  hurried  across  the  ravine  and  up  a  winding  road,  and 
stood  on  the  old  Acropolis,  with  the  prodigious  walls  of  the 
citadel  towering  above  our  heads.  We  did  not  stop  to  in 
spect  their  massive  blocks  of  marble,  or  measure  their  height, 
or  guess  at  their  extraordinary  thickness,  but  passed  at  once 
through  a  great  arched  passage  like  a  railway-tunnel,  and 
went  straight  to  the  gate  that  leads  to  the  ancient  temples.  It 
was  locked !  So,  after  all,  it  seemed  that  we  were  not  to 
see  the  great  Parthenon  face  to  face.  We  sat  down  and  held 
a  council  of  war.  Result :  The  gate  was  only  a  flimsy  struc 
ture  of  wood — we  would  break  it  down.  It  seemed  like  dese 
cration,  but  then  we  had  traveled  far,  and  our  necessities 
were  urgent.  We  could  not  hunt  up  guides  and  keepers — 
we  must  be  on  the  ship  before  daylight.  So  we  argued.  This 
was  all  very  fine,  but  when  we  came  to  break  the  gate,  we 
could  not  do  it.  We  moved  around  an  angle  of  the  wall  and*, 
found  a  low  bastion — eight  feet  high  without — ten  or  twelve 
within.  Denny  prepared  to  scale  it,  and  we  got  ready  to 
follow.  By  dint  of  hard  scrambling  he  finally  straddled  the 
top,  but  some  loose  stones  crumbled  away  and  fell  with  a 
crash  into  the  court  within.  There  was  instantly  a  banging 
of  doors  and  a  shout.  Denny  dropped  from  the  wall  in  a 
twinkling,  and  we  retreated  in  disorder  to  the  gate.  Xerxes 
took  that  mighty  citadel  four  hundred  and  eighty  years  be 
fore  Christ,  when  his  five  millions  of  soldiers  and  camp- 
followers  followed  him  to  Greece,  and  if  we  four  Americans- 
could  have  remained  unmolested  five  minutes  longer,  we  would 
have  taken  it  too. 

The  garrison  had  turned  out — four  Greeks.  We  clamored 
at  the  gate,  and  they  admitted  us.  [Bribery  and  corruption.] 

We  crossed  a  large  court,  entered  a  great  door,  and  stood 
upon  a  pavement  of  purest  white  marble,  deeply  worn  by, 
footprints.  Before  us,  in  the  flooding  moonlight,  rose  the 
noblest  ruins  we  had  ever  looked  upon — the  Propylsea;  a 


240  MARK  TWAIN 

small  temple  of  Minerva;  the  Temple  of  Hercules,  and  the 
grand  Parthenon.  [We  got  these  names  from  the  Greek 
guide,  who  didn't  seem  to  know  more  than  seven  men  ought 
to  know.]  These  edifices  were  all  built  of  the  whitest  Pen- 
telic  marble,  but  have  a  pinkish  stain  upon  them  now.^  Where 
any  part  is  broken,  however,  the  fracture  looks  like  fine  loaf- 
sugar.  Six  caryatides,  or  marble  women,  clad  in  flowing 
robes,  support  the  portico  of  the  Temple  of  Hercules,  but  the 
porticoes  and  colonnades  of  the  other  structures  are  formed 
of  massive  Doric  and  Ionic  pillars,  whose  flutings  and  capitals 
are  still  measurably  perfect,  notwithstanding  the  centuries 
that  have  gone  over  them  and  the  sieges  they  have  suffered. 
The  Parthenon,  originally,  was  two  hundred  and  twenty-six 
feet  long,  one  hundred  wide,  and  seventy  high,  and  had  two 
rows  of  great  columns,  eight  in  each,  at  either  end,  and  single 
rows  of  seventeen  each  down  the  sides,  and  was  one  of  the 
most  graceful  and  beautiful  edifices  ever  erected. 

Most  of  the  Parthenon's  imposing  columns  are  still  stand 
ing,  but  the  roof  is  gone.  It  was  a  perfect  building  two  hun 
dred  and  fifty  years  ago,  when  a  shell  dropped  into  the 
Venetian  magazine  stored  here,  and  the  explosion  which  fol 
lowed  wrecked  and  unroofed  it.  I  remember  but  little  about 
the  Parthenon,  and  I  have  put  in  one  or  two  facts  arid  figures 
for  the  use  of  other  people  with  short  memories.  Got  them 
from  the  guide-book. 

As  we  wandered  thoughtfully  down  the  marble-paved 
length  of  this  stately  temple,  the  scene  about  us  was  strangely 
impressive.  Here  and  there,  in  lavish  profusion,  were  gleam 
ing  white  statues  of  men  and  women,  propped  against  blocks 
of  marble,  some  of  them  armless,  some  without  legs,  others 
headless — but  all  looking  mournful  in  the  moonlight,  and 
startlingly  human!  They  rose  up  and  confronted  the  mid 
night  intruder  on  every  side — they  stared  at  him  with  stony 
eyes  from  unlooked-for  nooks  and  recesses;  they  peered  at 
him  over  fragmentary  heaps  far  down  the.  desolate  corri 
dors;  they  barred  his  way  in  the  midst  of  the  broad  forum, 
and  solemnly  pointed  with  handless  arms  the  way  from  the 
sacred  fane ;  and  through  the  roofless  temple  the  moon  looked 
down,  and  banded  the  floor  and  darkened  the  scattered  frag 
ments  and  broken  statues,  with  the  slanting  shadows  of  the 
columns. 

What  a  world  of  ruined  sculpture  was  about  us !  Set  up  in 
rows — stacked  up  in  piles — scattered  broadcast  over  the  wide 


irsg.  c£  trie  Arrxctis — w 
i-.  =czss  ii^-i   if  ±e  nfi?= 


..'±•1  i»"~_"   is^-: r^iie: 

"3~HZ.    1— Tti:    STT>' 

: .       :  . 

V  •:    '-"  " 

«    PrtZzitJi^   i^ii   Pi 


TV* 


242  MARK  TWAIN 

/the  silver  sea — not  on  the  broad  earth  is  there  another  picture 
//half  so  beautifulp 

(Ks  we  turned  and  moved  again  through  the  temple,  I  wished 
thaTthe  illustrious  men  who  had  sat  in  it  in  the  remote  ages 
could  visit  it  again  and  reveal  themselves  to  our  curious  eyes- 
Plato,  Aristotle,  Demosthenes,  Socrates,  Phocion,  Pythagoras, 
Euclid,  Pindar,  Xenophon,  Herodotus,  Praxiteles  and  Phidias, 
Zeuxis  the  painter.  What  a  constellation  of  celebrated  names  I 
But  more  than  all,  I  wished  that  old  Diogenes,  groping  so 
patiently  with  his  lantern,  searching  so  zealously  for  one 
solitary  honest  man  in  all  the  world,  might  meander  along 
and  stumble  on  our  party.  I  ought  not  say  it,  maybe,  but 
still  I  suppose  he  would  have  put  out  his  ligHy 

We  left  the  Parthenon  to  keep  its  watch  over  old  Athens, 
as  it  had  kept  it  for  twenty-three  hundred  years,  and  went 
and  stood  outside  the  walls  of  the  citadel.  In  the  distance  was 
the  ancient,  but  still  almost  perfect,  Temple  of  Theseus,  and 
close  by  looking  to  the  WTest,  was  the  Bema,  from  whence 
Demosthenes  thundered  his  philippics  and  fired  the  wavering 
patriotism  of  his  countrymen.  To  the  right  was  Mars  Hill, 
where  the  Areopagus  sat  in  ancient  times,  and  where  St.  Paul 
defined  his  position,  and  below  was  the  market-place  where 
he  "disputed  daily"  with  the  gossip-loving  Athenians.  Wre 
climbed  the  stone  steps  St.  Paul  ascended,  and  stood  in  the 
square-cut  place  he  stood  in,  and  tried  to  recollect  the  Bible 
account  of  the  matter — but  for  certain  reasons,  I  could  not 
recall  the  words.  I  have  found  them  since. 

Now  while  Paul  waited  for  them  at  Athens,  his  spirit  was  stirred 
in  him,  when  he  saw  the  city  wholly  given  up  to  idolatry. 

Therefore  disputed  he  in  the  synagogue  with  the  Jews,  and  with 
the  devout  persons,  and  in  the  market  daily  with  them  that  met  with 
him. 

And  they  took  him  and  brought  him  unto  Areopagus,  saying,  May 
we  know  what  this  new  doctrine  whereof  thou  speakest  is? 

Then  Paul  stood  in  the  midst  of  Mars  hill,  and  said,  "Ye  men  of 
Athens,  I  perceive  that  in  all  things  ye  are  too  superstitious; 

For  as  I  passed  by  and  beheld  your  devotions,  I  found  an  altar  with     , 
this    inscription:      To    THE    UNKNOWN    GOD.      Whom,    therefore,    ye 
ignorantly  worship,  him  declare  I  unto  you.— Acts,  ch.  xvii. 

It  occured  to  us,  after  a  while,  that  if  we  wanted  to  get 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  243 

home  before  daylight  betrayed  us,  we  had  better  be  moving. 
So  we  hurried  away.  When  far  on  our  road,  we  had  a 
parting  view  of  the  Parthenon,  with  the  moonlight  streaming 
through  its  open  colonnades  and  touching  its  capitals  with 
silver.  As  it  looked  then,  solemn,  grand,  and  beautiful,  it 
will  always  remain  in  our  memories. 

As  we  marched  along,  we  began  to  get  over  our  fears,  and 
ceased  to  care  much  about  quarantine  scouts  or  anybody  else. 
We  grow  bold  and  reckless;  and  once,  in  a  sudden  burst  of 
courage,  I  even  threw  a  stone  at  a  dog.  It  was  pleasant  reflec 
tion,  though,  that  I  did  not  hit  him,  because  his  master  might 
just  possibly  have  been  a  policeman.  Inspired  by  this  happy 
failure,  my  valor  became  utterly  uncontrollable,  and  at  intervals 
I  absolutely  whistled,  though  on  a  moderate  key.  But  boldness 
breeds  boldness,  and  shortly  I  plunged  into  a  vineyard,  in 
the  full  light  of  the  moon,  and  captured  a  gallon  of  superb 
grapes,  not  even  minding  the  presence  of  a  peasant  who  rode 
by  on  a  mule.  Denny  and  Birch  followed  my  example.  Now 
I  had  grapes  enough  for  a  dozen,  but  then  Jackson  was  all 
swollen  up  with  courage,  too,  and  he  was  obliged  to  enter  a 
vineyard  presently.  The  first  bunch  he  seized  brought  trouble. 
A  frowsy,  bearded  brigand  sprang  into  the  road  with  a  shout, 
and  flourish  a  musket  in  the  light  of  the  moon!  We  sidled 
toward  the  Piraeus — not  running,  you  understand,  but  only 
advancing  with  celerity.  The  brigand  shouted  again,  but  still 
we  advanced.  It  was  getting  late,  and  we  had  no  time  to  fool 
away  on  every  ass  that  wanted  to  drivel  Greek  platitudes  to 
us.  We  would  just  as  soon  have  talked  with  him  as  not  if 
we  had  not  been  in  a  hurry.  Presently  Denny  said,  "Those 
fellows  are  following  us !" 

We  turned  and,  sure  enough,  there  they  were — three  fantas 
tic  pirates  armed  with  guns.  We  slackened  our  pace  to  let  them 
come  up,  and  in  the  mean  time  I  got  out  my  cargo  of  grapes 
and  dropped  them  firmly  but  reluctantly  into  the  shadows 
by  the  wayside.  But  I  was  not  afraid.  I  only  felt  that  it 
was  not  right  to  steal  grapes.  And  all  the  more  so  when  the 
owner  was  around — and  not  only  around,  but  with  his  friends 
around  also.  The  villains  came  up  and  searched  a  bundle  Dr. 
Birch  had  in  his  hand,  and  scowled  upon  him  when  they 
found  it  had  nothing  in  it  but  some  holy  rocks  from  Mars 
Hill,  and  these  were  not  contraband.  They  evidently  suspected 
him  of  playing  some  wretched  fraud  upon  them,  and  seemed 
half  inclined  to  scalp  the  party.  But  finally  they  dismissed 


244  MARK  TWAIN 

us  with  a  warning,  couched  in  excellent  Greek,  I  suppose, 
and  dropped  tranquilly  in  our  wake.  When  they  had  gone 
three  hundred  yards  they  stopped,  and  we  went  on  rejoiced. 
But  behold,  another  armed  rascal  came  out  of  the  shadows 
and  took  their  place,  and  followed  us  two  hundred  yards.  Then 
he  delivered  us  over  to  another  miscreant,  who  emerged  from 
some  mysterious  place,  and  he  in  turn  to  another !  For  a  mile 
and  a  half  our  rear  was  guarded  all  the  while  by  arrned  men. 
I  never  traveled  in  so  much  state  before  in  all  my  life. 

It  was  a  good  while  after  that  before  we  ventured  to  steal 
any  more  grapes,  and  when  we  did  we  stirred  up  another 
troublesome  brigand,  and  then  we  ceased  all  further  specula 
tion  in  that  line.  I  suppose  that  fellow  that  rode  by  on  the  mule 
posted  all  the  sentinels,  from  Athens  to  the  Piraeus,  about  us. 

Every  field  on  that  long  route  was  watched  by  an  armed 
sentinel,  some  of  whom  had  fallen  asleep,  no  doubt,  but  were 
on  hand,  nevertheless.  This  shows  what  sort  of  a  country 
modern  Attica  is — a  community  of  questionable  characters. 
These  men  were  not  there  to  guard  their  possessions  against 
strangers,  but  against  each  other;  for  strangers  seldom  visit 
Athens  and  the  Piraeus,  and  when  they  do,  they  go  in  daylight, 
and  can  buy  all  the  grapes  they  want  for  a  trifle.  The  modern 
inhabitants  are  confiscators  and  falsifiers  of  high  repute,  if 
gossip  speaks  truly  concerning  them,  and  I  freely  believe  it 
does. 

Just  as  the  earliest  tinges  of  the  dawn  flushed  the  eastern 
sky  and  turned  the  pillared  Parthenon  to  a  broken  harp  hung 
in  the  pearly  horizon,  we  closed  our  thirteenth  mile  of  weary, 
roundabout  marching,  and  emerged  upon  the  seashore  abreast 
the  ships,  with  our  usual  escort  of  fifteen  hundred  Piraean 
dogs  howling  at  our  heels.  We  hailed  a  boat  that  was  two 
or  three  hundred  yards  from  shore,  and  discovered  in  a  mo 
ment  that  it  was  a  police-boat  on  the  lookout  for  any  quaran 
tine-breakers  that  might  chance  to  be  abroad.  So  we  dodged — 
we  were  used  to  that  by  this  time — and  when  the  scouts 
reached  the  spot  we  had  so  lately  occupied,  we  were  absent. 
They  cruised  along  the  shore,  but  in  the  wrong  direction,  and 
shortly  our  own  boat  issued  from  the  gloom  and  took  us 
aboard.  They  had  heard  our  signal  on  the  ship.  We  rowed 
noiselessly  away,  and  before  the  police-boat  came  in  sight 
again,  we  were  safe  at  home  once  more. 

Four  more  of  our  passengers  were  anxious  to  visit  Athens, 
and  started  half  an  hour  after  we  returned ;  but  they  had  not 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  245 

been  ashore  five  minutes  till  the  police  discovered  and  chased 
them  so  hotly  that  they  barely  escaped  to  their  boat  again, 
and  that  was  all.     They  pursued  the  enterprise  no  further. 
^ye  set  sail  for  Constantinople  to-day,  but  some  of  us  little  I 
care  for  that.     We  have  seen  all  there  was  to  see  in  the  old  j 
city  that  had  its  birth  sixteen  hundred  years  before   Christ  ; 
was  born,  and  was  an  old  town  before  the  foundations  of  Troy  I 
were  laid — and  saw  it  in  its^jnost  attractive  aspect.     Where-  I 
fore,  why  should  we  worry?  ] 

Two  other  passengers  rari  the  blockade  successfully  last 
night.  So  we  learned  this  morning.  They  slipped  away  so 
quietly  that  they  were  not  missed  from  the  ship  for  several 
hours.  They  had  the  hardihood  to  march  into  the  Piraeus 
in  the  early  dusk  and  hire  a  carriage.  They  ran  some  danger 
of  adding  two  or  three  month's  imprisonment  to  the  other 
novelties  of  their  Holy  Land  Pleasure  Excursion.  I  admire 
"'cheek."1  But  they  went  and  came  safely,  and  never  walked 
a  step. 

JQuotation  from  the  Pilgrims. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

FROM   Athens   all   through   the   islands   of    the   Grecian 
Archipelago,    we    saw    little    but    forbidding    sea-walls 
and  barren  hills,  sometimes   surmounted   by  three  or 
four    graceful     columns     of     some     ancient     temple,     lonely 
and  deserted — a  fitting  symbol  of  the  desolation  that  has  come 
upon  all  Greece  in  these  latter  ages.    We  saw  no  plowed  fields, 
very  few  villages,  no  trees  or  grass  or  vegetation  of  any  kind, 
scarcely,  and  hardly  ever  an  isolated  house.  ^Greece  is  a  bleak, 
\  unsmiling  desert,  without  agriculture,  manufactures,  or  com 
merce,  apparently.     What  supports  its  poverty-stricken  people 
or  its  government,  is  a  mystery?^ 

I  suppose  that  ancient  Greeee^  and  modern  Greece  com 
pared,  furnish  the  most  extravagant  contrast  to  be  found  in 
history.  George  I.,  an  infant  of  eighteen,  and  a  scraggy  nest 
of  foreign  office-holders,  sit  in  the  palaces  of  Themistocles, 
Pericles,  and  the  illustrious  scholars  and  generals  of  the 
Golden  Age  of  Greece.  The  fleets  that  were  the  wonder  of 
the  world  when  the  Parthenon  was  new,  are  a  beggarly  handful 
of  fishing-smacks  now,  and  the  manly  people  that  performed 
such  miracles  of  valor  at  Marathon  are  only  a  tribe  of  un- 
considered  slaves  to-day.  The  classic  Ilissus  has  gone  dry, 
and  so  have  all  the  sources  of  Grecian  wealth  and  greatness. 
The  nation  numbers  only  eight  hundred  thousand  souls,  and 
there  is  poverty  and  misery  and  mendacity  enough  among 
them  to  furnish  them  forty  millions  and  be  liberal  about  it.  I 
Under  King  Otho  the  revenues  of  the  state  were  §ve  millions 
of  dollars — raised  from  a  tax  of  one-tenth  of  all  the  agricul 
tural  products  of  the  land  (which  tenth  the  farmer  had  to 
bring  to  the  royal  granaries  on  pack-mules  any  distance  not 
exceeding  six  leagues)  and  from  extravagant  taxes  on  trade 
and  commerce.  Out  of  that  five  millions  the  small  tyrant  tried 
to  keep  an  army  of  ten  thousand  men,  pay  all  the  hundreds 
of  useless  Grand  Equerries  in  Waiting,  First  Grooms  of  the 
Bedchamber,  Lord  High.  Chancellors  of  the  Exploded  Ex 
chequer,  and  all  the  other  absurdities  which  these  puppy- 
kingdoms  indulge  in,  in  imitation  of  the  great  monarchies; 

246 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  247 

and  in  addition  he  set  about  building  a  white  marble  palace  to 
cost  about  five  millions  itself.  The  result  was,  simply:  Ten 
into  five  goes  no  times  and  none  over.  All  these  things  could 
not  be  done  with  five  millions,  and  Otho  fell  into  trouble. 

The  Greek  throne,  with  its  unpromising  adjuncts  of  a  ragged 
population  of  ingenious  rascals  who  were  out  of  employment 
eight  months  in  the  year  because  there  was  little  for  them  to 
borrow  and  less  to  confiscate,  and  a  waste  of  barren  hills  and 
weed-grown  deserts,  went  begging  for  a  good  while.  It  was 
offered  to  one  of  Victoria's  sons,  and  afterward  to  various 
other  younger  sons  of  royalty  who  had  no  thrones  and  were 
out  of  business,  but  they  all  had  the  charity  to  decline  the 
dreary  honor,  and  veneration  enough  for  Greece's  ancient 
greatness  to  refuse  to  mock  her  sorrowful  rags  and  dirt  with 
a  tinsel  throne  in  this  day  of  her  humiliation — till  they  came 
to  this  young  Danish  George,  and  he  took  it.  He  has  finished 
the  splendid  palace  I  saw  in  the  radiant  moonlight  the  other 
night,  and  is  doing  many  other  things  for  the  salvation  of 
Greece,  they  say. 

We  sailed  through  the  barren  Archipelago,  and  into  the 
narrow  channel  they  sometimes  call  the  Dardanelles  and  some 
times  the  Hellespont.  (This  part  of  the  country  is  rich  in  \\ 
historic  reminiscences,  and  poor  as  Sahara  in  everything  else7v 
For  instance,  as  we  approached  the  Dardanelles,  we  coasted 
along  the  Plains  of  Troy  and  past  the  mouth  of  the  Scamander ; 
we  saw  where  Troy  had  stood  (in  the  distance),  and  where 
it  does  not  stand  now — a  city  that  perished  when  the  world 
was  young.  The  poor  Trojans  are  all  dead  now.  They  were 
born  too  late  to  see  Noah's  ark,  and  died  too  soon  to  see  our 
menagerie.  We  saw  where  Agamemnon's  fleets  rendezvoused, 
and  away  inland  a  mountain  which  the  map  said  was  Mount 
Ida.  Within  the  Hellespont  we  saw  where  the  original  first 
shoddy  contract  mentioned  in  history  was  carried  out,  and  the 
"parties  of  the  second  part"  gently  rebuked  by  Xerxes.  I 
speak  of  the  famous  bridge  of  boats  which  Xerxes  ordered  to 
be  built  over  the  narrowest  part  of  the  Hellespont  (where  it 
is  only  two  or  three  miles  wide).  A  moderate  gale  destroyed 
the  flimsy  structure,  and  the  King,  thinking  that  to  publicly 
rebuke  the  contractors  might  have  a  good  effect  on  the  next 
set,  called  them  out  before  the  army  and  had  them  beheaded. 
In  the  next  ten  minutes  he  let  a  new  contract  for  the  bridge. 
It  has  been  observed  by  ancient  writers  that  the  second  bridge 
was  a  very  good  bridge.  Xerxes  crossed  his  host  of  five 


248  MARK  TWAIN 

millions  of  men  on  it,  and  if  it  had  not  been  purposely  de 
stroyed,  it  would  probably  have  been,  there  yet.  If  our  gov 
ernment  would  rebuke  some  of  our  shoddy  contractors  oc 
casionally,  it  might  work  much  good.  In  the.  Hellespont  we 
saw  where  Leander  and  Lord  Byron  ^swam  across,  the  one 
to  see  her  upon  whom  his  soul's  affections  were  fixed  with  a 
devotion  that  only  death  could  impair,  and  the  other  merely 
for  a  flyer,  as  Jack  says.  We  had  two  noted  tombs  near  us, 
too.  On  one  shore  slept  Ajax,  and  on  the  other  Hecuba. 

We  had  water  batteries  and  forts  on  both  sides  of  the  Helles 
pont,  flying  the  crimson  flag  of  Turkey,  with  its  white  cres 
cent,  and  occasionally  a  village,  and  sometimes 'a  train  of 
camels;  we  had  all  these  to  look  at  till  we  entered  the  broad 
sea  of 'Marmora,  and  then  the  land  soon  fading  from  view, 
we  resumed  euchre  and  whist  once  more. 

We  dropped  anchor  in  the  mouth  of  the  Golden  Horn  at 
daylight  in  the  morning.  Only  three  or  four  of  us  were  up 
to  see  the  great  Ottoman  capital.  The  passengers  do  not  turn 
out  at  unseasonable  hours,  as  they  used  to,  to  get  the  earliest 
possible  glimpse  of  strange  foreign  cities.  They  are  well  over 
that.  If  we  were  lying  in  sight  of  the  Pyramids  of  Egypt, 
they  would  not  come  on  deck  until  after  breakfast,  nowadays. 
The  Golden  Horn  is  a  narrow  arm  of  the  sea,  which  brandies 
from  the  Bosporus  (a  sort  of  broad  river  which  connects  the 
Marmora  and  Black  Seas),  and,  curving  around,  divides  the 
city  in  the  middle.  Galata  and  Pera  are  on  one  side  of  the 
Bosporus,  and  the  Golden  Horn;  Stamboul  (ancient  Byzan 
tium)  is  upon  the  other.  On  the  other  bank  of  the  Bosporus 
is  Scutari  and  other  suburbs  of  Constantinople.  This  great- 
city  contains  a  million  inhabitants,  but  so  narrow  are  its  streets, 
and  so  crowded  together  are  its  houses,  that  it  does  not  cover 
much  more  than  half  as  much  ground  as  New  York  City,- 
Seen  from  the  anchorage  or  from  a  mile  or  so  up  the  Bosporus 
it  is  by  far  the  handsomest  city  we  have  seen.  Its  dense  array 
of  houses  swells  upward  from  the  water's  edge,  and  spreads 
over  the  domes  of  many  hills ;  and  the  gardens  that  peep  out 
here  and  there,  the  great  globes  of  the  mosques,  and  the  count 
less  minarets  that  meet  the  eye  everywhere,  invest  the  metro 
polis  with  the  quaint  Oriental  aspect  one  dreams  of  when  he 
reads  books  of  Eastern  travel.  Constantinople  makes  a  noble 
picture. 

But  its  attractiveness  begins  and  ends  with  its  picturesque- 
ness.    From  the  time  one  starts  ashore  till  he  gets  back  again. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  249 

he  execrates  it.  The  boat  he  goes  in  is  admirably  miscalcu 
lated  for  the  service  it  is  built  for.  It  is  handsomely  and  neatly 
fitted  up,  but  no  man  could  handle  it  well  in  the  turbulent  cur 
rents  that  sweep  down  the  Bosporus  from  the  Black  Sea,  and 
few  men  could  row  it  satisfactorily  even  in  still  water.  It  is 
a  long,  light  canoe  (caique),  large  at  one  end  and  tapering  to 
a  knife-blade  at  the  other.  They  make  that  long  sharp  end 
the  bow,  and  you  can  imagine  how  these  boiling  currents  spin 
it  about.  It  has  two  oars,  and  sometimes  four,  and  no  rudder. 
You  start  to  go  to  a  given  point  and  you  run  in  fifty  different 
directions  before  you  get  there.  First  one  oar  is  backing  water, 
and  then  the  other ;  it  is  seldom  that  both  are  going  ahead  at 
once.  This  kind  of  boating  is  calculated  to  drive  an  impatient 
man  mad  in  a  week.  The  boatmen  are  the  awkwardest,  the 
stupidest,  and  the  most  unscientific  on  earth,  without  ques 
tion. 

•-  Ashore,  it  was — well,  it  was  an  eternal  circus.  People  were 
thicker  than  bees,  in  those  narrow  streets,  and  the  men  were 
dressed  in  all  the  outrageous,  outlandish,  idolatrous,  extrava 
gant,  thunder-and-lightning  costumes  that  ever  a  tailor  with 
the  delirium  tremens  and  seven  devils  could  conceive  of. 
There  was  no  freak  in  dress  too  crazy  to  be  indulged  in;  no 
absurdity  too  absurd  to  be  tolerated;  no  frenzy  in  ragged 
diabolism  too  fantastic  to  be  attempted.  No  two  men  were 
dressed  alike.  It  was  a  wild  masquerade  of  all  imaginable 
costumes — every  struggling  throng  in  every  street  was  a  dis 
solving  view  of  stunning  contrasts.  Some  patriarchs  wore 
awful  turbans,  but  the  grand  mass  of  the  infidel  horde  wore 
the  fiery  red  skull-cap  they  call  a  fez.  All  the  remainder  of 
the  raiment  they  indulged  in  was  utterly  indescribable. 

The  shops  here  are  mere  coops,  mere  boxes,  bathrooms, 
closets — anything  you  please  to  call  them — on  the  first  floor. 
The  Turks  sit  cross-legged  in  them,  and  work  and  trade  and 
smoke  long  pipes,  and  smell  like — like  Turks.  That  covers 
the  ground.  Crowding  the  narrow  streets  in  front  of  them 
are  beggars,  who  beg  forever,  yet  never  collect  anything;  and 
wonderful  cripples,  distorted  out  of  all  semblance  of  humanity, 
almost;  vagabonds  driving  laden  asses;  porters  carrying  dry- 
goods  boxes  as  large  as  cottages  on  their  backs;  peddlers  of 
grapes,  hot  corn,  pumpkin  seeds,  and  a  hundred  other  things, 
yelling  like  fiends ;  and  sleeping  happily,  comfortably,  serenely, 
among  the  hurrying  feet,  are  the  famed  dogs  of  Constantinople ; 
drifting  noiselessly  about  are  squads  of  Turkish  women,  draped 


250  MARK  TWAIN 

from  chin  to  feet  in  flowing  robes,  and  with  snowy  veils 
bound  about  their  heads,  that  disclose  only  the  eyes  and  a 
vague,  shadowy  notion  of  their  features.  Seen  moving  about, 
far  away  in  the  dim,  arched  aisles  of  the  Great  Bazar,  they 
look  as  the  shrouded  dead  must  have  looked  when  they  walked 
forth  from  their  graves  amid  the  storms  and  thunders  and 
earthquakes  that  burst  upon  Calvary  that  awful  night  of  the 
Crucifixion.  A  street  in  Constantinople  is  a  picture  which  one 
ought  to  see  once — not  oftener. 

And  then  there  was  the  goose-rancher — a  fellow  who  drove 
a  hundred  geese  before  him  about  the  city,  and  tried  to  sell 
them.  He  had  a  pole  ten  feet  long,  with  a  crook  in  the  end 
of  it,  and  occasionally  a  goose  would  branch  out  from  the  flock 
and  make  a  lively  break  around  the  corner,  with  wings  half 
lifted  and  neck  stretched  to  its  utmost.  Did  the  goose-mer 
chant  get  excited?  No.  He  took  his  pole  and  reached  after 
that  goose  with  unspeakable  sang  froid — took  a  hitch  round 
his  neck,  and  "yanked"  him  back  to  his  place  in  the  flock  with- 
.out  an  effort.  He  steered  his  geese  with  that  stick  as  easily 
as  another  man  would  steer  a  yawl.  A  few  hours  afterward 
we  saw  him  sitting  on  a  stone  at  a  corner,  in  the  midst  of  the 
turmoil,  sound  asleep  in  the  sun,  with  his  geese  squatting 
around  him,  or  dodging  out  of  the  way  of  asses  and  men.  We 
came  by  again,  within  the  hour,  and  he  was  taking  account  of 
stock,  to  see  whether  any  of  his  flock  had  strayed  or  been 
stolen.  The  way  he  did  it  was  unique.  He  put  the  end  of  his 
stick  within  six  or  eight  inches  of  a  stone  wall,  and  made  the 
geese  march  in  single  file  between  it  and  the  wall.  He  counted 
them  as  they  went  by.  There  was  no  dodging  that  arrange 
ment. 

(R  you  want  dwarfs — I  mean  just  a  few  dwarfs  for  a  curi 
osity — go  to  Genoa.  If  you  wish  to  buy  them  by  the  grossf 
for  retail,  go  to  Milan.  There  are  plenty  of  dwarfs  all  over 
Italy,  but  it  did  seem  to  me  that  in  Milan  the  crop  was  luxuri 
ant.  If  you  would  see  a  fair  average  style  of  assorted  cripples, 
go  to  Naples,  or  travel  through  the  Roman  states.  But  if  you 
would  see  the  very  heart  and  home  of  cripples  and  human 
monsters,  both,  go  straight  to  Constantinople,  A  beggar  in. 
Naples  who  can  show  a  foot  which  has  all  run  into  one  hor 
rible  toe,  with  one  shapeless  nail  on  it,  has  a  fortune — but 
;such  an  exhibition  as  that  would  not  provoke  any  notice  in 
Constantinople.  The  man  would  starve.  Who  would  pay 
•  any  attention  to  attractions  like  his  among  the  rare  monsters 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  251 

that  throng  the  bridges  of  the  Golden  Horn  and  display  their 
deformities  in  the  gutters  of   Stamboul?     Oh,  wretched  irn-   I 
poster !    How  could  he  stand  against  the  three-legged  woman,    I 
and  the  man  with  his  eye  in  his  cheek?    How  would  he  blush   j 
in  presence  of  the  man  with  fingers  on  his  elbow?     Where 
would  he  hide  himself  when  the  dwarf  with  seven  fingers  on    • 
each  hand,  no  upper  lip,  and  his  under- jaw  gone,  came  down  / 
in  his  majesty?     Bismillah!     The  cripples  of   Europe  are  a 
delusion  and  a  fraud.     The  truly  gifted  flourish  only  in  the 
byways  of  Pera  and  StambouIT) 

That  three-legged  woman  lay  on  the  bridge,  with  her  stock 
in  trade  so  disposed  as  to  command  the  most  striking  effect — 
one  natural  leg,  and  two  long,  slender,  twisted  ones  with  feet 
on  them  like  somebody  else's  forearm.  Then  there  was  a  man 
further  along  who  had  no  eyes,  and  whose  face  was  the  color 
of  a  fly-blown  beefsteak,  and  wrinkled  and  twisted  like  a 
lava-flow — and  verily  so  tumbled  and  distorted  were  his 
features  that  no  man  could  tell  the  wart  that  served  him  for 
a  nose  from  his  cheekbones.  In  Stamboul  was  a  man  with  a 
prodigious  head,  an  uncommonly  long  body,  legs  eight  inches 
long,  and  feet  like  snow-shoes.  He  traveled  on  those  feet  and 
his  hands,  and  was  as  sway-backed  as  if  the  Colossus  of 
Rhodes  had  been  riding  him.  Ah,  a  beggar  has  to  have  ex 
ceedingly  good  points  to  make  a  living  in  Constantinople.  A 
blue-faced  man,  who  had  nothing  to  offer  except  that  he  had 
been  blown  up  in  a  mine,  would  be  regarded  as  a  rank  im 
postor,  and  a  mere  damaged  soldier  on  crutches  would  never 
make  a  cent.  It  would  pay  him  to  get  a  piece  of  his  head 
taken  off,  and  cultivate  a  wen  like  a  carpet-sack. 

The  Mosque  of  St.  Sophia  is  the  chief  lion  of  Constantinople. 
You  must  get  a  firman  and  hurry  there  the  first  thing.  We  did 
that.  We  did  not  get  a  firman,  but  we  took  along  four  or  five 
francs  apiece,  which  is  much  the  same  thing. 

I  do  not  think  much  of  the  Mosque  of  St.  Sophia.  I  sup 
pose  I  lack  appreciation.  We  will  let  it  go  at  that.  It  is  the 
rustiest  old  barn  in  heathendom.  I  believe  all  the  interest 
that  attaches  to  it  comes  from  the  fact  that  it  was  built  for  a 
Christian  church  and  then  turned  into  a  mosque,  without  much 
alteration,  by  the  Mohammedan  conquerors  of  the  land.  They 
made  me  take  off  my  boots  and  walk  into  the  place  in  my 
stocking  feet.  I  caught  cold,  and  got  myself  so  stuck  up  with 
a  complication  of  gums,  slime,  and  general  corruption,  that 
I  wore  out  more  than  two  thousand  pair  of  boot-jacks  get- 


252  MARK  TWAIN 

ting  my  boots  off  that  night,  and  even  then  some  Christian 
hide  peeled  off  with  them.  I  abate  not  a  single  boot- jack. 

St.  Sophia  is  a  colossal  church,  thirteen  or  fourteen  hun 
dred  years  old,  and  unsightly  enough  to  be  very,  very  much 
older.  Its  immense  dome  is  said  to  be  more  wonderful  than 
St.  Peter's,  but  its  dirt  is  much  more  wonderful  than  its  dome, 
though  they  never  mention  it.  The  church  has  a  hundred  and 
seventy  pillars  in  it,  each  a  single  piece,  and  all  of  costly  mar 
bles  of  various  kinds,  but  they  came  from  ancient  temples  at 
Baalbec,  Heliopolis,  Athens,  and  Ephesus,  and  are  battered, 
ugly,  and  repulsive.  They  were  a  thousand  years  old  when 
this  church  was  new,  and  then  the  contrast  must  have  been 
ghastly — if  Justinian's  architects  did  not  trim  them  any.  The 
inside  of  the  dome  is  figured  all  over  with  a  monstrous  inscrip 
tion  in  Turkish  characters,  wrought  in  gold  mosaic,  that  looks 
as  glaring  as  a  circus  bill ;  the  pavements  and  the  marble  balus 
trades  are  all  battered  and  dirty;  the  perspective  is  marred 
everywhere  by  a  web  of  ropes  that  depend  from  the  dizzy 
height  of  the  dome,  and  suspend  countless  dingy,  coarse  oil- 
lamps,  and  ostrich  eggs,  six  or  seven  feet  above  the  floor. 
Squatting  and  sitting  in  groups,  here  and  there  and  far  and 
near,  were  ragged  Turks  reading  books,  hearing  sermons,  or 
receiving  lessons  like  children,  and  in  fifty  places  were  more 
of  the  same  sort  bowing  and  straightening  up,  bowing  again 
and  getting  down  to  kiss  the  earth,  muttering  prayers  the 
while,  and  keeping  up  their  gymnastics  till  they  ought  to  have 
been  tired,  if  they  were  not. 

Everywhere  was  dirt  and  dust  and  dinginess  and  gloom  ; 
everywhere  were  signs  of  a  hoary  antiquity,  but  with  nothing 
touching  or  beautiful  about  it;  everywhere  were  those  groups 
of  fantastic  pagans;  overhead  the  gaudy  mosaics  and  the  web 
of  lamp-ropes — nowhere  was  there  anything  to  win  one's  lovef 
or  challenge  his  admiration. 

The  people  who  go  into  ecstasies  over  St.  Sophia  must 
surely  get  them  out  of  the  guide-book  { where  every  church 
is  spoken  of  as  being  "considered  by  good  judges  to  be  the 
most  marvelous  structure,  in  many  respects,  that  the  world 
has  ever  seen").  Or  else  they  are  those  old  connoisseurs  from 
the  wilds  of  New  Jersey  who  laboriously  learn  the  difference 
between  a  fresco  and  a  fire-plug,  and  from  that  day  forward 
feel  privileged  to  void  their  critical  bathos  on  painting,  sculp 
ture,  and  architecture  forevermore. 

We  visited  the  Dancing  Dervishes.    There  were  twenty-one 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  253 

of  them.  They  wore  a  long,  light-colored  loose  robe  that  hung 
to  their  heels.  Each  in  his  turn  went  up  to  the  priest  (they 
were  all  within  a  large  circular  railing)  and  bowed  profoundly 
and  then  went  spinning  away  deliriously  and  took  his  ap 
pointed  place  in  the  circle,  and  continued  to  spin.  When  all 
had  spun  themselves  to  their  places,  they  were  about  five  or  six 
feet  apart — and  so  situated,  the  entire  circle  of  spinning  pagans 
spun  itself  three  separate  times  around  the  room.  It  took 
twenty-five  minutes  to  do  it.  They  spun  on  the  left  foot,  and 
kept,  themselves  going  by  passing  the  right  rapidly  before  it 
and  digging  it  against  the  waxed  floor.  Some  of  them  made  in 
credible  "time."  Most  of  them  spun  around  forty  times  in  a 
minute,  and  one  artist  averaged  about  sixty-one  times  a  min 
ute,  and  kept  it  up  during  the  whole  twenty-five.  His  robe 
filled  with  air  and  stood  out  all  around  him  like  a  balloon. 

They  made  no  noise  of  any  kind,  and  most  of  them  tilted 
their  heads  back  and  closed  their  eyes,  entranced  with  a  sort  of 
devotional  ecstasy.  There  was  a  rude  kind  of  music,  part  of 
the  time,  but  the  musicians  were  not  visible.  None  but  spinners 
were  allowed  within  the  circle.  A  man  had  to  either  spin  or 
stay  outside.  It  was  about  as  barbarous  an  exhibition  as  we 
have  witnessed  yet.  Then  sick  persons  came  and  lay  down, 
and  beside  them  women  laid  their  sick  children  (one  a  babe 
at  the  breast),  and  the  patriarch  of  the  Dervishes  walked  upon 
their  bodies.  He  was  supposed  to  cure  their  diseases  by 
trampling  upon  their  breasts  or  backs  or  standing  on  the  back 
of  their  necks.  This  is  well  enough  for  a  people  who  think 
all  their  affairs  are  made  or  marred  by  viewless  spirits  of  the  air 
— by  giants,  gnomes,  and  genii — and  who  still  believe,  to  this 
day,  all  the  wild  tales  in  the  Arabian  Nights.  Even  so  an 
intelligent  missionary  tells  me. 

We  visited  the  Thousand  and  One  Columns.  I  do  not  know 
what  it  was  originally  intended  for,  but  they  said  it  was  built 
for  a  reservoir.  It  is  situated  in  the  center  of  Constantinople. 
You  go  down  a  flight  of  stone  steps  in  the  middle  of  a  barren 
place,  and  there  you  are.  You  are  forty  feet  underground, 
and  in  the  midst  of  a  perfect  wilderness  of  tall,  slender,  granite 
columns,  of  Byzantine  architecture.  Stand  where  you  would, 
or  change  your  position  as  often  as  you  pleased,  you  were  al 
ways  a  center  from  which  radiated  a  dozen  long  archways  and 
colonnades  that  lost  themselves  in  distance  and  the  somber 
twilight  of  the  place.  This  old  dried-up  reservoir  is  occupied 
by  a  few  ghostly  silk-spinners  now,  and  one  of  them  showed 


254  MARK  TWAIN 

me  a  cross  cut  high  up  in  one  of  the  pillars.  I  suppose  he 
meant  me  to  understand  that  the  institution  was  there  before 
the  Turkish  occupation,  and  I  thought  he  made  a  remark  to 
that  effect ;  but  he  must  have  had  an  impediment  in  his  speech, 
for  I  did  not  understand  him. 

We  took  off  our  shoes  and  went  into  the  marble  mausoleum 
of  the  Sultan  Mahmoud,  the  neatest  piece  of  architecture, 
inside,  that  I  have  seen  lately.  Mahmoud's  tomb  was  covered 
with  a  black  velvet  pall,  which  was  elaborately  embroidered 
with  silver;  it  stood  within  a  fancy  silver  railing;  at  the  side 
and  corners  were  silver  candlesticks  that  would  weigh  more 
than  a  hundred  pounds,  and  they  supported  candles  as  large 
as  a  man's  leg ;  on  the  top  of  the  sarcophagus  was  a  fez,  with 
a  handsome  diamond  ornament  upon  it,  which  an  attendant 
said  cost  a  hundred  thosand  pounds,  and  lied  like  a  Turk  when 
he  said  it.  Mahmoud's  whole  family  were  comfortably 
planted  around  him. 

We  went  to  the  Great  Bazar  in  Stamboul,  of  course,  and 
I  shall  not  describe  it  further  than  to  say  it  is  a  monstrous  hive 
of  little  shops — thousands,  I  should  say — all  under  one  roof, 
and  cut  up  into  innumerable  little  blocks  by  narrow  streets 
which  are  arched  overhead.  One  street  is  devoted  to  a  par 
ticular  kind  of  merchandise,  another  to  another,  and  so  on. 
When  you  wish 'to  buy  a  pair  of  shoes  you  have  the  swing  of 
the  whole  street — you  do  not  have  to  walk  yourself  down 
hunting  stores  in  different  localities.  It  is  the  same  with  silks, 
antiquities,  shawls,  etc.  The  place  is  crowded  with  people  all 
the  time,  and  as  the  gay-colored  Eastern  fabrics  are  lavishly 
displayed  before  every  shop,  the  Great  Bazar  of  Stamboul  is 
one  of  the  sights  that  are  worth  seeing.  It  is  full  of  life,  and 
stir,  and  business,  dirt,  beggars,  asses,  yelling  peddlers,  por- 
ters,  dervishes,  high-born  Turkish  female  shoppers,  Greeks,- 
and  weird-looking  and  weirdly  dressed  Mohammedans  from 
the  mountains  and  the  far  provinces — and  the  only  solitary 
thing  one  does  not  smell  when  he  is  in  the  Great  Bazar,  is 
something  which  smells  good. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

f  11   yl~OSOUES  are  plenty,  churches  are  plenty,  graveyards  » 
jV/l      are  plenty,  but  morals  and  whisky  are  scarce.     The 

Koran  does  not  permit  Mohammedans  to  drink    Their  / 
natural  instincts  do  not  permit  them  to  be  moralt}    They  say  j 
the  Sultan  has  eight  hundred  wives.     This  almosi  amounts  to 
bigamy.     It  makes  our  cheeks  burn  with  shame  to  see  such  a 
thing  permitted  here  in  Turkey.    We  do  not  mind  it  so  much 
in  Salt  Lake,  however. 

Circassian  and  Georgian  girls  are  still  sold  in  Constantinople 
by  their  parents,  but  not  publicly.  The  great  slave-marts  we 
have  all  read  so  much  about — where  tender  young  girls  were 
stripped  for  inspection,  and  criticized  and  discussed  just  as  if 
they  were  horses  at  an  agricultural  fair — no  longer  exist.  The 
exhibition  and  the  sales  are  private  now.  Stocks  are  up,  just 
at  present,  partly  because  of  a  brisk  demand  created  by  the  re 
cent  return  of  the  Sultan's  suite  from  the  courts  of  Europe; 
partly  on  account  of  an  unusual  abundance  of  breadstuff's, 
which  leaves  holders  untortured  by  hunger  and  enables  them 
to  hold  back  for  high  prices;  and  partly  because  buyers  are 
too  weak  to  bear  the  market,  while  sellers  are  amply  prepared 
to  bull  it.  Under  these  circumstances,  if  the  American  metro 
politan  newspapers  were  published  here  in  Constantinople,  their 
next  commercial  report  would  read  about  as  follows,  I  suppose : 

SLAVE-GIRL  MARKET  REPORT 

Best  brands  Circassians,  crop  of  1850,  £200;  1852,  £250;  1854,  £300. 
Best  brands  Georgian,  none  in  market;  second  quality,  1851,  £180. 
"Nineteen  fair  to  middling  Wailachian  girls  offered  at  £130  @  150,  but 
no  takers;  sixteen  prime  Al  sold  in  small  lots  to  close  out — terms 
private. 

Sales  of  one  lot  of  Circassians,  prime  to  good,  1852  to  1854,  at  £240 
@  242^,  buyer  30;  one  forty-niner — damaged — at  £23,  seller  ten, 
no  deposit.  Several  Georgians,  fancy  brands,  1852,  changed  hands 
to  fill  orders.  The  Georgians  now  on  hand  are  mostly  last  year's 
crop,  which  was  unusually  poor.  The  new  crop  is  a  little  backward, 
but  will  be  coming  in  shortly.  As  regards  its  quantity  and  quality, 

255 


256  MARK  TWAIN 

the  accounts  are  most  encouraging.  In  this  connection  we  can  safely 
say,  also,  that  the  new  crop  of  Circassians  is  looking  extremely  well. 
His  Majesty  the  Sultan  has  already  sent  in  large  orders  for  his  new 
harem,  which  will  be  finished  within  a  fortnight,  and  this  has  naturally 
strengthened  the  market  and  given  Circassian  stock  a  strong  upward 
tendency.  Taking  advantage  of  the  inflated  market,  many  of  our 
shrewdest  operators  are  selling  short.  There  are  hints  of  a  "corner'' 
on  Wallachians. 

There  is  nothing  new  in  Nubians.     Slow  sale. 

Eunuchs—none  offering;  however,  large  cargoes  are  expected  from 
Egypt  to-day. 

I  think  the  above  would  be  about  the  style  of  the  commercial 
report.  Prices  are  pretty  high  now,  and  holders  firm;  but, 
two  or  three  years  ago,  parents  in  a  starving  condition  brought 
their  young  daughters  down  here  and  sold  them  for  even 
twenty  and  thirty  dollars,  when  they  could  do  no  better,  simply 
to  save  themselves  and  the  girls  from  dying  of  want.  It  is 
sad  to  think  of  so  distressing  a  thing  as  this,  and  I  for  one  am 
sincerely  glad  the  prices  are  up  again. 

(Commercial  morals,  especially,  are  bad.  There  is  no  gain 
saying  that.  Greek,  Turkish,  and  Armenian  morals  consist 
only  in  attending  church  regularly  on  the  appointed  Sabbaths, 
and  in  breaking  the  ten  commandments  all  the  balance  of  the 
week.  It  comes  natural  to  them  to  lie  and  cheat  in  the  first 
|  place,  and  then  they  go  on  and  improve  on  nature  until  they 
arrive  at  perfection!)  In  recommending  his  son  to  a  merchant 
as  a  valuable  salesman,  a  father  does  not  say  he  is  a  nice,  moral, 
upright  boy,  and  goes  to  Sunday-school  and  is  honest,  but  he 
says,  "This  boy  is  worth  his  weight  in  broad  pieces  of  a  hun 
dred — for  behold,  he  will  cheat  whomsoever  hath  dealings  with 
him,  and  from  the  Euxine  to  the  waters  of  Marmora  there 
abideth  not  so  gifted  a  liar !"  How  is  that  for  a  recommmenda-* 
tion?  The  missionaries  tell  me  that  they  hear  encomiums  like 
that  passed  upon  people  every  day.  They  say  of  a  person  they 
admire,  "Ah,  he  is  a  charming  swindler,  and  a  most  exquisite 
liar !" 

Everybody  lies  and  cheats — everybody  who  is  in  business, 
at  any  rate.  Even  foreigners  soon  have  to  come  down  to  the 
custom  of  the  country,  and  they  do  not  buy  and  sell  long  in 
Constantinople  till  they  lie  and  cheat  like  a  Greek.  I  say  like 
a  Greek,  because  the  Greeks  are  called  the  worst  transgressors 
in  this  line.  Several  Americans,  long  resident  in  Constan 
tinople,  contend  that  most  Turks  are  pretty  trustworthy,  but 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  257 

few  claim  that  the  Greeks  have  any  virtues  that  a  man  can 
discover — at  least  without  a  fire  assay. 

I  am  half  willing  to  believe  that  the  celebrated  dog's  of  Con 
stantinople  have  been  misrepresented — slandered.  I  have  al 
ways  been  led  to  suppose  that  they  were  so  thick  in  the  streets 
that  they  blocked  the  way;  that  they  moved  about  in  organized 
companies,  platoons,  and  regiments,  and  took  what  they  wanted 
by  determined  and  ferocious  assault;  and  that  at  night  they 
drowned  all  other  sounds  with  their  terrible  howlings.  The 
dogs  I  see  here  cannot  be  those  I  have  read  of. 

I  find  them  everywhere,  but  not  in  strong  force.  The  most 
I  have  found  together  has  been  about  ten  or  twenty.  And 
night  or  day  a  fair  proportion  of  them  were  sound  asleep. 
Those  that  were  not  asleep  always  looked  as  if  they  wanted  to 
be.  I  never  saw  such  utterly  wretched,  starving,  sad-visaged, 
broken-hearted  looking  curs  in  my  life.  It  seemed  a  grim 
satire  to  accuse  such  brutes  as  these  of  taking  things  by  force 
of  arms.  They  hardly  seemed  to  have  strength  enough  or 
ambition  enough  to  walk  across  the  street — I  do  not  know  that 
I  have  seen  one  walk  that  far  yet.  They  are  mangy  and  bruised 
and  mutilated,  and  often  you'  see  one  with  the  hair  singed  off 
him  in  such  wide  and  well-defined  tracts  that  he  looks  like  a 
map  of  the  new  Territories.  They  are  the  sorriest  beasts  that 
breathe — the  most  abject — the  most  pitiful.  In  their  faces  is 
a  settled  expression  of  melancholy,  an  air  of  hopeless  despond 
ency.  The  hairless  patches  on  a  scalded  dog  are  preferred  by 
the  fleas  of  Constantinople  to  a  wider  range  on  a  healthier 
dog;  and  the  exposed  places  suit  the  fleas  exactly.  I  saw  a 
dog  of  this  kind  start  to  nibble  at  a  flea — a  fly  attracted  his 
attention,  and  he  made  a  snatch  at  him ;  the  flea  called  for  him 
once  more,  and  that  forever  unsettled  him ;  he  looked  sadly  at 
his  flea-pasture,  then  sadly  looked  at  his  bald  spot.  Then  he 
heaved  a  sigh  and  dropped  his  head  resignedly  upon  his  paws. 
He  was  not  equal  to  the  situation. 

The  dogs  sleep  in  the  streets,  all  over  the  city.  From  one  end 
of  the  street  to  the  other,  I  suppose  they  will  average  about 
eight  or  ten  to  a  block.  Sometimes,  of  course,  there  are  fifteen 
or  twenty  to  a  block.  They  do  not  belong  to  anybody,  and  they 
seem  to  have  no  close  personal  friendship  among  each  other. 
But  they  district  the  city  themselves,  and  the  dogs  of  each 
district,  whether  it  be  half  a  block  in  extent,  or  ten  blocks,  have 
to  remain  within  its  bounds.  Woe  to  a  dog  if  he  crosses  the 
line !  His  neighbors  would  snatch  the  balance  of  his  hair  off 
in  a  second.  So  it  is  said.  But  they  don't  look  it. 


258  MARK  TWAIN 

They  sleep  in  the  streets  these  days.  They  are  my  compass 
— my  guide.  When  I  see  the  dogs  sleep  placidly  on,  while 
men,  sheep,  geese,  and  all  moving  things  turn  out  and  go  around 
them,  I  know  I  am  not  in  the  great  street  where  the  hotel  is, 
and  must  go  further.  In  the  Grand  Rue  the  dogs  have  a  sort 
of  air  of  being  on  the  lookout — an  air  born  of  being  obliged  to 
get  out  of  the  way  of  many  carriages  every  day-— and  that  ex 
pression  one  recognizes  in  a  moment.  It  does  not  exist  upon 
the  face  of  any  dog  without  the  confines  of  that  street.  All 
others  sleep  placidly  and  keep  no  watch.  They  would  not 
move,  though  the  Sultan  himself  passed  by. 

In  one  narrow  street  (but  none  of  them  are  wide)  I  saw 
three  dogs  lying  coiled  up,  about  a  foot  or  two  apart.  End 
to  end  they  lay,  and  so  they  just  bridged  the  street  neatly, 
from  gutter  to  gutter.  A  drove  of  a  hundred  sheep  came  along. 
They  stepped  right  over  the  dogs,  the  rear  crowding  the  front, 
impatient  to  get  on.  The  dogs  looked  lazily  up,  flinched  a  lit 
tle  when  the  impatient  feet  of  the  sheep  touched  their  raw 
backs — sighed,  and  lay  peacefully  down  again.  No  talk  could 
be  plainer  than  that.  So  some  of  the  sheep  jumped  over  them 
and  others  scrambled  between,  occasionally  chipping  a  leg  with 
their  sharp  hoofs,  and  when  the  whole  flock  had  made  the 
trip,  the  dogs  sneezed  a  little,  in  the  cloud  of  dust,  but  never 
budged  their  bodies  an  inch.  I  thought  I  was  lazy,  but  I  am 
a  steam-engine  compared  to  a  Constantinople  dog.  But  was 
not  that  a  singular  scene  for  a  city  of  a  million  inhabitants  ? 

These  dogs  are  the  scavengers  of  the  city.  That  is  their 
official  position,  and  a  hard  one  it  is.  However,  it  is  their  pro 
tection.  But  for  their  usefulness  in  partially  cleansing  these 
terrible  streets,  they  would  not  be  tolerated  long.  They  eat 
anything  and  everything  that  comes  in  their  way,  from  melon-, 
rinds  an  spoiled  grapes  up  through  all  the  grades  and  species- 
of  dirt  and  refuse  to  their  own  dead  friends  and  relatives — and 
yet  they  are  always  lean,  always  hungry,  always  despondent. 
The  people  are  loth  to  kill  them — do  not  kill  them,  in  fact, 
The  Turks  have  an  innate  antipathy  to  taking  the  life  of  any 
dumb  animal,  it  is  said.  But  they  do  worse.  They  hang  and 
kick  and  stone  and  scald  these  wretched  creatures  to  the  very 
verge  of  death,  and  then  leave  them  to  live  and  suffer. 

Once  a  Sultan  proposed  to  kill  off  all  the  dogs  here,  and  did 
begin  the  work — but  the 'populace  raised  such  a  howl  of  hor 
ror  about  it  that  the  massacre  was  stayed.  After  a  while,  he 
proposed  to  remove  them  all  to  an  island  in  the  Sea  of  Mar 
mora.  No  objection  was  offered,  and  a  ship-load  or  so  was 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  259 

taken  away.  But  when  it  came  to  be  known  that  somehow  or 
other  the  dogs  never  got  to  the  island,  but  always  fell  over 
board  in  the  night  and  perished,  another  howl  was  raised  and 
the  transportation  scheme  was  dropped. 

So  the  dogs  remain  in  peaceable  possession  of  the  streets. 
1  do  not  say  that  they  do  not  howl  at  night,  nor  that  they  do 
not  attack  people  who  have  not  a  red  fez  on  their  heads.  I 
only  say  that  it  would  be  mean  for  me  to  accuse  them  of  these 
unseemly  things  who  have  not  seen  them  do  them  with  my 
own  eyes  or  heard  them  with  my  own  ears. 

I  was  a  little  surprised  to  see  Turks  and  Greeks  playing 
newsboy  right  here  in  the  mysterious  land  where  the  giants 
and  genii  of  the  Arabian  Nights  once  dwelt — where  winged 
horses  and  hydra-headed  dragons  guarded  enchanted  castles — 
where  Princes  and  Princesses  flew  through  the  air  on  carpets 
cthat  obeyed  a  mystic  talisman — where  cities  whose  houses  were 
made  of  precious  stones  sprang  up  in  a  night  under  the  hand 
of  the  magician,  and  where  busy  marts  were  suddenly  stricken 
with  a  spell  and  each  citizen  lay  or  sat,  or  stood  with  weapon 
raised  or  foot  advanced,  just  as  he  was,  speechless  and  motion 
less,  till  time  had  told  a  hundred  years! 

It  was  curious  to  see  newsboys  selling  papers  in  so  dreamy 
a  land  as  that.  And,  to  say  truly,  it  is  comparatively  a  new 
thing  here.  The  selling  of  newspapers  had  its  birth  in  Con 
stantinople  about  a  year  ago,  and  was  a  child  of  the  Prussian 
and  Austrian  war. 

There  is  one  paper  published  here  in  the  English  language — 
the  Levant  Herald — and  there  are  generally  a  number  of  Greek 
and  a  few  French  papers  rising  and  falling,  struggling  up  and 
falling  again.  Newspapers  are  not  popular  with  the  Sultan's 
Government.  They  do  not  understand  journalism.  The  pro 
verb  says,  "The  unknown  is  always  great."  To  the  court,  the 
newspaper  is  a  mysterious  and  rascally  institution.  They  know 
what  a  pestilence  is,  because  they  have  one  occasionally  that 
thins  the  people  out  at  the  rate  of  two  thousand  a  day,  and  they 
regard  a  newspaper  as  a  mild  form  of  pestilence.  When  it  goes 
astray,  they  suppress  it — pounce  upon  it  without  warning,  and 
throttle  it.  When  it  don't  go  astray  for  a  long  time,  they  get 
suspicious  and  throttle  it  anyhow,  because  they  think  it  is 
hatching  deviltry.  Imagine  the  Grand  Vizier  in  solemn  coun 
cil  with  the  magnates  of  the  realm,  spelling  his  way  through 
the  hated  newspaper,  and  finally  delivering  his  profound  de 
cision  :  "This  thing  means  mischief — it  is  too  darkly,  too 


260  MARK  TWAIN 

suspiciously  inoffensive — suppress  it !    Warn  the  publisher  that 
we  cannot  have  this  sort  of  thing:  put  the  editor  in  prison!" 

The  newspaper  business  has  its  inconveniences  in  Constan 
tinople.  Two  Greek  papers  and  one  French  one  were  sup 
pressed  here  within  a  few  days  of  each  other.  No  victories  of 
the  Cretans  are  allowed  to  be  printed.  From  time  to  time  the 
Grand  Vizier  sends  a  notice  to  the  various  editors  that  the 
Cretan  insurrection  is  entirely  suppressed,  and  although  that 
editor  knows  better,  he  still  has  to  print  the  notice.  The 
Levant  Herald  is  too  fond  of  speaking  praisefully  of  Ameri 
cans  to  be  popular  with  the  Sultan,  who  does  not  relish  our 
sympathy  with  the  Cretans,  and  therefore  that  paper  has  to  be 
particularly  circumspect  in  order  to  keep  out  of  trouble.  Once 
the  editor,  forgetting  the  official  notice  in  his  paper  that  the 
Cretans  were  crushed  out,  printed  a  letter  of  a  very  different 
tenor,  from  the  American  Consul  in  Crete,  and  was  fined  two 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  for  it.  Shortly  he  printed  another 
from  the  same  source  and  was  imprisoned  three  months  for  his 
pains.  I  think  I  could  get  the  assistant  editorship  of  the 
Levant  Herald,  but  I  am  going  to  try  to  worry  along  without  it. 

To  suppress  a  paper  here  involves  the  ruin  of  the  publisher, 
almost.  But  in  Naples  I  think  they  speculate  on  misfortunes 
of  that  kind.  Papers  are  suppressed  there  every  day,  and 
spring  up  the  next  day  under  a  new  name.  During  the  ten 
days  or  a  fortnight  we  stayed  there  one  paper  was  murdered 
and  resurrected  twice.  The  newsboys  are  smart  there,  just 
as  they  are  elsewhere.  They  take  advantage  of  popular  weak 
nesses.  When  they  find  they  are  not  likely  to  sell  out,  they 
approach  a  citizen  mysteriously,  and  say  in  a  low  voice — 
"Last  copy,  sir:  double  price;  paper  just  been  suppressed!' 
The  man  buys  it,  of  course,  and  finds  nothing  in  it.  They  do . 
say<— I  do  not  vouch  for  it— but  they  do  say  that  men  some 
times  print  a  vast  edition  of  a  paper,  with  a  ferociously  sedi 
tious  article  in  it,  distribute  it  quickly  among  the  newsboys,  and 
clear  out  ^till  the  Government's  indignation  cools.  It  pays  well. 
Confiscation  don't  amount  to  anything.  The  type  and  presses 
are  not  worth  taking  care  of. 

There  is  only  one  English  newspaper  in  Naples.  It  has 
seventy  subscribers.  The  publisher  is  getting  rich  very  delib 
erately — very  deliberately  .indeed. 

I  shall  never  want  another  Turkish  lunch.  The  cooking 
apparatus  was  in  a  little  lunch-room,  near  the  bazar,  and  it 
was  all  open  to  the  street.  The  cook  was  slovenly,  and  so  was 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  261 

the  table,  and  it  had  no  cloth  on  it.  The  fellow  took  a  mass 
of  sausage-meat  and  coated  it  round  a  wire  and  laid  it  on  a 
charcoal  fire  to  cook.  When  it  was  done,  he  laid  it  aside  and 
a  dog  walked  sadly  in  and  nipped  it.  He  smelt  it  first,  and 
probably  recognized  the  remains  of  a  friend.  The  cook  took 
it  away  from  him  and  laid  it  before  us.  Jack  said,  "I  pass" — 
he  plays  euchre  sometimes — and  we  all  passed  in  turn.  Then 
the  cook  baked  a  broad,  flat,  wheaten  cake,  greased  it  well 
with  the  sausage,  and  started  towards  us  with  it.  It  dropped 
in  the  dirt,  and  he  picked  it  up  and  polished  it  on  his  breeches, 
and  laid  it  before  us.  Jack  said,  "pass."  We  all  passed.  He 
put  some  eggs  in  a  frying-pan,  and  stood  pensively  prying 
slabs  of  meat  from  between  his  teeth  with  a  fork.  Then  he 
used  the  fork  to  turn  the  eggs  with — and  brought  them  along. 
Jack  said  "Pass  again."  All  followed  suit.  We  did  not 
know  what  to  do,  and  so  we  ordered  a  new  ration  of  sausage. 
The  cook  got  out  his  wire,  apportioned  a  proper  amount  of 
sausage-meat,  spat  on  his  hands,  and  fell  to  work !  This 
time,  with  one  accord,  we  all  passed  out.  We  paid  and  left. 
That  is  all  I  learned  about  Turkish  lunches.  A  Turkish  lunch 
is  good,  no  doubt,  but  it  has  its  little  drawbacks. 

When  I  think  how  I  have  been  swindled  by  books  of  Oriental 
travel,  I  want  a  tourist  for  breakfast.  For  years  and  years  I 
have  dreamed  of  the  wonders  of  the  Turkish  bath;  for  years 
and  years  I  have  promised  myself  that  I  would  yet  enjoy  one. 
Many  and  many  a  time,  in  fancy,  I  have  lain  in  the  marble 
bath,  and  breathed  the  slumbrous  fragrance  of  Eastern  spices 
that  filled  the  air;  then  passed  through  a  weird  and  compli 
cated  system  of  pulling  and  hauling  and  drenching  and  scrub 
bing,  by  a  gang  of  naked  savages  who  loomed  vast  and  vaguely 
through  the  steaming  mists,  like  demons ;  then  rested  for  a 
while  on  a  divan  fit  for  a  king;  then  passed  through  another 
complex  ordeal,  and  one  more  fearful  than  the  first;  and, 
finally,  swathed  in  soft  fabrics,  been  conveyed  to  a  princely 
saloon  and  laid  on  a  bed  of  eiderdown,  where  eunuchs, 
gorgeous  of  costume,  fanned  me  while  I  drowsed  and  dreamed, 
or  contentedly  gazed  at  the  rich  hangings  of  the  apartment, 
the  soft  carpets,  the  sumptuous  furniture,  the  pictures,  and 
drank  delicious  coffee,  smoked  the  soothing  narghili,  and 
dropped,  at  the  last,  into  tranquil  repose,  lulled  by  sensuous 
odors  from  unseen  censers,  by  the  gentle  influence  of  the  nar- 
ghili's  Persian  tobacco,  and  by  the  music  of  fountains  that 
counterfeited  the  pattering  of  summer  rain. 


262  MARK  TWAIN 

That  was  the  picture,  just  as  1  got  it  from  incendiary  books 
of  travel.  It  was  a  poor,  miserable  imposture.  The  reality 
is  no  more  like  it  than  the  Five  Points  are  like  the  Garden  of 
Eden.  They  received  me  in  a  great  court,  paved  with  marble 
slabs;  around  it  were  broad  galleries,  one  above  another,  car 
peted  with  seedy  matting,  railed  with  unpainted  balustrades, 
and  furnished  with  huge  rickety  chairs,  cushioned  with  rusty 
old  mattresses,  indented  with  impressions  left  by  the  forms  of 
nine  successive  generations  of  men  who  had  reposed  upon 
them.  The  place  was  vast,  naked,  dreary;  its  court  a  barn, 
its  galleries  stalls  for  human  horses.  The  cadaverous,  half- 
nude  varlets  that  served  in  the  establishment  had  nothing  of 
poetry  in  their  appearance,  nothing  of  romance,  nothing  of 
Oriental  splendor.  They  shed  no  entrancing  odors — just  the 
contrary.  Their  hungry  eyes  and  their  lank  forms  continually 
suggested  one  glaring,  unsentimental  fact — they  wanted  what 
they  term  in  California  "a  square  meal." 

I  went  into  one  of  the  racks  and  undressed.  An  unclean 
starveling  wrapped  a  gaudy  table-cloth  about  his  loins,  and 
hung  a  white  rag  over  iny  shoulders.  If  I  had  had  a  tub  then, 
it  would  have  come  natural  to  me  to  take  in  washing.  I  was 
then  conducted  down-stairs  into  the  wet,  slippery  court,  and 
the  first  things  that  attracted  my  attention  were  my  heels.  My 
fall  excited  no  comment.  They  expected  it,  no  doubt.  It  be 
longed  in  the  list  of  softening,  sensuous  influences  peculiar  to 
this  home  of  Eastern  luxury.  It  was  softening  enough,  cer 
tainly,  but  its  application  was  not  happy.  They  now  gave  me 
a  pair  of  wooden  clogs — benches  in  miniature,  with  leather 
straps  over  them  to  confine  my  feet  (which  they  would  have 
done,  only  I  do  not  wear  No.  13's).  These  things  dangled  un 
comfortably  by  the  straps  when  I  lifted  up  my  feet,  and  came  . 
down  in  awkward  and  unexpected  places  when  I  put  them  on 
the  floor  again,  and  sometimes  turned  sideways  and  wrenched 
my  ankles  out  of  joint.  However,  it  was  all  Oriental  luxury, 
and  I  did  what  I  could  to  enjoy  it. 

They  put  me  in  another  part  of  the  barn  and  laid  me  on  a 
stuffy  sort  of  pallet,  which  was  not  made  of  cloth  of  gold,  or 
Persian  shawls,  but  was  merely  the  unpretending  sort  of  thing 
I  have  seen  in  the  negro  quarters  of  Arkansas.  There  was 
nothing  whatever  in  this  dim  marble  prison  but  five  more  of 
these  biers.  It  was  a  very  solemn  place.  I  expected  that  the 
spiced  odors  of  Araby  were  going  to  steal  over  my  senses,  now, 
but  they  did  not.  A  copper-colored  skeleton  with  a  rag 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  263 

around  him,  brought  me  a  glass  decanter  of  water,  with  a 
lighted  tobacco  pipe  in  the  top  of  it,  and  a  pliant  stem  a  yard 
long,  with  a  brass  mouthpiece  to  it. 

It  was  the  famous  "narghili"  of  the  East — the  thing  the 
Grand  Turk  smokes  in  the  pictures.  This  began  to  look  like 
luxury.  I  took  one  blast  at  it,  and  it  was  sufficient ;  the  smoke 
went  in  a  great  volume  down  into  my  stomach,  my  lungs,  even 
into  the  uttermost  parts  of  my  frame.  I  exploded  one  mighty 
cough,  and  it  was  as  if  Vesuvius  had  let  go.  For  the  next  five 
minutes  I  smoked  at  every  pore,  like  a  frame  house  that  is  on 
fire  on  the  inside.  Not  any  more  narghili  for  me.  The  smoke 
had  a  vile  taste,  and  the  taste  of  a  thousand  infidel  tongues  that 
remained  on  that  brass  mouthpiece  was  viler  still.  I  was  get 
ting  discouraged.  Whenever,  hereafter,  I  see  the  cross-legged 
Grand  Turk  smoking  his  narghili,  in  pretended  bliss,  on  the 
outside  of  a  paper  of  Connecticut  tobacco,  I  shall  know  him 
for  the  shameless  humbug  he  is. 

This  prison  was  filled  with  hot  air.  When  I  had  got 
warmed  up  sufficiently  to  prepare  me  for  a  still  warmer  tem 
perature,  they  took  me  where  it  was — into  a  marble  room,  wet, 
slippery,  and  steamy,  and  laid  me  out  on  a  raised  platform  in 
the  center.  It  was  very  warm.  Presently  my  man  sat  me 
down  by  a  tank  of  hot  water,  drenched  me  well,  gloved  his 
hand  with  a  coarse  mitten,  and  began  to  polish  me  all  over 
with  it.  I  began  to  smell  disagreeably.  The  more  he  polished 
the  worse  I  smelt.  It  was  alarming.  I  said  to  him: 

"I  perceive  that  I  am  pretty  far  gone.  It  is  plain  that  I 
ought  to  be  buried  without  any  unnecessary  delay.  Perhaps 
you  had  better  go  after  my  friends  at  once,  because  the  weather 
is  warm,  and  I  cannot  'keep'  long." 

He  went  on  scrubbing,  and  paid  no  attention.  I  soon  saw 
that  he  was  reducing  my  size.  He  bore  hard  on  his  mitten,  and 
from  under  it  rolled  little  cylinders,  like  macaroni.  It  could 
not  be  dirt,  for  it  was  too  white.  He  pared  me  down  in  this 
way  for  a  long  time.  Finally  I  said : 

"It  is  a  tedious  process.  It  will  take  hours  to  trim  me  to 
the  size  you  want  me ;  I  will  wait ;  go  and  borrow  a  jack-plane." 

He  paid  no  attention  at  all. 

After  a  while  he  brought  a  basin,  some  soap,  and  something 
that  seemed  to  be  the  tail  of  a  horse.  He  made  up  a  prodigious 
quantity  of  soap-suds,  deluged  me  with  them  from  head  to 
foot,  without  warning  me  to  shut  my  eyes,  and  then  swabbed 
me  viciously  with  the  horse-tail.  Then  he  left  me  there,  a 


264  MARK  TWAIN 

snowy  statue  of  lather,  and  went  away.  When  I  got  tired  of 
waiting  I  went  and  hunted  him  up.  He  was  propped  against 
the  wall,  in  another  room,  asleep.  I  woke  him.  He  was  not 
disconcerted.  He  took  me  back  and  flooded  me  with  hot  water, 
then  turbaned  my  head,  swathed  me  with  dry  table-cloths,  and 
conducted  me  to  a  latticed  chicken-coop  in  one  of  the  galleries, 
and  pointed  to  one  of  those  Arkansas  beds.  I  mounted  it,  and 
vaguely  expected  the  odors  of  Araby  again.  They  did  not  come. 

The  blank,  unornamented  coop  had  nothing  about  it  of  that 
oriental  voluptuousness  one  reads  of  so  much.  It  was  more 
suggestive  of  the  county  hospital  than  anything  else.  The 
skinny  servitor  brought  a  narghili,  and  I  got  him  to  take  it 
out  again  without  wasting  any  time  about  it.  Then  he  brought 
the  world-renowned  Turkish  coffee  that  poets  have  sung  so 
rapturously  for  many  generations,  and  I  seized  upon  it  as  the 
last  hope  that  was  left  of  my  old  dreams  of  Eastern  luxury. 
It  was  another  fraud.  Of  all  the  unchristian  beverages  that 
ever  passed  my  lips,  Turkish  coffee  is  the  worst.  The  cup  is 
small,  it  is  smeared  with  grounds;  the  coffee  is  black,  thick, 
unsavory  of  smell,  and  execrable  in  taste.  The  bottom  of  the 
cup  has  a  muddy  sediment  in  it  half  an  inch  deep.  This  goes 
down  your  throat,  and  portions  of  it  lodge  by  the  way,  and 
produce  a  tickling  aggravation  that  keeps  you  barking  and 
coughing  for  an  hour. 

Here  endeth  my  experience  of  the  celebrated  Turkish  bath, 
and  here  also  endeth  my  dream  of  the  bliss  the  mortal  revels 
in  who  passes  through  it.  It  is  a  malignant  swindle.  The  man 
who  enjoys  it  is  qualified  to  enjoy  anything  that  is  repulsive  to 
sight  or  sense,  and  he  that  can  invest  it  with  a  charm  of  poetry 
is  able  to  do  the  same  with  anythng  else  in  the  world  that  is 
tedious,  and  wretched,  and  dismal,  and  nasty. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

X  1C  TE  left  a  dozen  passengers  in  Constantinople,  and  sailed 
Y  \  through  the  beautiful  Bosporus  and  far  up  into  the 
Black  Sea.  We  left  them  in  the  clutches  of  the  cele 
brated  Turkish  guide,  "FAR-AWAY  MOSES/'  who  will  seduce 
them  into  buying  a  ship-load  of  attar  of  roses,  splendid  Turkish 
vestments,  and  all  manner  of  curious  things  they  can  never  have 
any  use  for.  Murray's  invaluable  guide-books  have  mentioned 
Far-away  Moses'  name,  and  he  is  a  made  man.  He  rejoices 
daily  in  the  fact  that  he  is  a  recognized  celebrity.  However, 
*we  cannot  alter  our  established  customs  to  please  the  whims 
of  guides;  we  cannot  show  partialities  this  late  in  the  day. 
Therefore,  ignoring  this  fellow's  brilliant  fame,  and  ignoring 
the  fanciful  name  he  takes  such  pride  in,  we  called  him  Fer 
guson,  just  as  we  had  done  with  all  other  guides.  It  has  kept 
him  in  a  state  of  smothered  exasperation  all  the  time.  Yet 
we  meant  him  no  harm.  After  he  has  gotten  himself  up  re 
gardless  of  expense,  in  showy,  baggy  trousers,  yellow,  pointed 
slippers,  fiery  fez,  silken  jacket  of  blue,  voluminous  waist- 
sash  of  fancy  Persian  stuff  rilled  with  a  battery  of  silver- 
mounted  horse-pistols,  and  has  strapped  on  his  terrible  simitar, 
he  considers  it  an  unspeakable  humiliation  to  be  called  Fergu 
son.  It  cannot  be  helped.  All  guides  are  Fergusons  to  us. 
We  cannot  master  their  dreadful  foreign  names. 

Sebastopol  is  probably  the  worst  battered  town  in  Russia,  or 
anywhere  else.  But  we  ought  to  be  pleased  with  it,  neverthe 
less,  for  we  have  been  in  no  country  yet  where  we  have  been 
.so  kindly  received,  and  where  we  felt  that  to  be  Americans  was 
a  sufficient  vise  for  our  passports.  The  moment  the  anchor 
was  down,  the  Governor  of  the  town  immediately  despatched 
an  officer  on  board  to  inquire  if  he  could  be  of  any  assistance 
to  us,  and  to  invite  us  to  make  ourselves  at  home  in  Sebastopol ! 
If  you  know  Russia,  you  know  that  this  was  a  wild  stretch  of 
hospitality.  They  are  usually  so  suspicious  of  strangers  that 
they  worry  them  excessively  with  the  delays  and  aggravations 
incident  to  a  complicated  passport  system.  Had  we  come  from 
any  other  country  we  could  not  have  had  permission  to  enter 

265 


266  MARK  TWAIN 

Sebastopol  and  leave  again  under  three  days— but  as  it  was, 
we  were  at  liberty  to  go  and  come  when  and  where  we  pleased. 
Everybody  in  Constantinople  warned  us  to  be  very  careful  about 
our  passports,  see  that  they  were  strictly  en  regie,  and  never 
to  mislay  them  for  a  moment:  and  they  told  us  of  numerous 
instances  of  Englishmen  and  others  who  were  delayed  days, 
weeks,  and  even  months,  in  Sebastopol,  on  account  of  trifling 
informalities  in  their  passports,  and  for  which  they  were  not  to 
blame.  I  had  lost  my  passport,  and  was  traveling  under  my 
room-mate's,  who  stayed  behind  in  Constantinople  to  await 
our  return.  To  read  the  description  of  him  in  that  passport 
and  then  look  at  me,  any  man  could  see  that  I  was  no  more  like 
him  than  I  am  like  Hercules.  So  I  went  into  the  harbor  of 
Sebastopol  with  fear  and  trembling — full  of  vague,  horrible 
apprehension  that  I  was  going  to  be  found  out  and  hanged. 
But  all  that  time  my  true  passport  had  been  floating  gallantly 
overhead — and  behold  it  was  only  our  flag.  They  never  asked 
us  for  any  other. 

We  have  had  a  great  many  Russian  and  English  gentlemen 
and  ladies  on  board  to-day,  and  the  time  has  passed  cheerfully 
away.  They  were  all  happy-spirited  people,  and  I  never  heard 
our  mother-tongue  sound  so  pleasantly  as  it  did  wrhen  it  fell 
from  those  English  lips  in  this  far-off  land.  I  talked  to  the 
Russians  a  good  deal,  just  to  be  friendly,  and  they  talked  to 
me  from  the  same  motive;  I  am  sure  that  both  enjoyed  the 
conversation,  but  never  a  word  of  it  either  of  us  understood. 
I  did  most  of  my  talking  to  those  English  people  though,  and 
I  am  sorry  we  cannot  carry  some  of  them  along  with  us. 

We  have  gone  whithersoever  we  chose,  to-day,  and  have 
met  with  nothing  but  the  kindest  attentions.  Nobody  inquired 
whether  we  had  any  passports  or  not. 

Several  officers  of  the  government  have  suggested  that 
we  take  the  ship  to  a  little  watering-place  thirty  miles  from 
here,  and  pay  the  Emperor  of  Russia  a  visit.  He  is  rusticating 
there.  These  officers  said  they  would  take  it  upon  themselves 
to  insure  us  a  cordial  reception.  They  said  if  we  would  go, 
they  would  not  only  telegraph  the  Emperor,  but  send  a  special 
courier  overland  to  announce  our  coming.  Our  time  is  so 
short,  though,  and  more  especially  our  coal  is  so  nearly  out, 
that  we  judged  it  best  to  forego  the  rare  pleasure  of  holding 
social  intercourse  with  an  Emperor. 

Ruined  Pompeii  is  in  good  condition  compared  to  Sebasto 
pol.  (Here,  you  may  look  in  whatsoever  direction  you  please, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  267 

and  your  eye  encounters  scarcely  anything  but  ruin,  ruin,  ruin ! 
— fragments  of  houses,  crumbled  walls,  torn  and  ragged  hills, 
devastation  everywhere !  It  is  as  if  a  mighty  earthquake  had 
spent  all  its  terrible  forces  upon  this  one  little  spot.  For 
eighteen  long  months  the  storms  of  war  beat  upon  the  helpless 
town,  and  left  it  at  last  the  saddest  wreck  that  ever  the  sun 
has  looked  upoiiT>  Not  one  solitary  house  escaped  unscathed — 
not  one  remaineonabitable,  even.  Such  utter  and  complete  ruin 
one  could  hardly  conceive  if.  The  houses  had  all  been  solid, 
dressed-stone  structures;  most  of  them  were  plowed  through 
and  through  by  cannon-balls — unroofed  and  sliced  down  from 
eaves  to  foundation — and  now  a  row  of  them,  half  a  mile 
long,  looks  merely  like  an  endless  procession  of  battered  chim 
neys.  No  semblance  of  a  house  remains  in  such  as  these.  Some 
of  the  larger  buildings  had  corners  knocked  off;  pillars  cut  in 
two ;  cornices  smashed ;  holes  driven  straight  through  the  walls. 
'Many  of  these  holes  are  as  round  and  as  cleanly  cut  as  if  they 
had  been  made  with  an  auger.  Others  are  half  pierced  through, 
and  the  clean  impression  is  there  in  the  rock,  as  smooth  and  as 
shapely  as  if  it  were  done  in  putty.  Here  and  there  a  ball 
still  sticks  in  a  wall,  and  from  it  iron  tears  trickle  down  and 
discolor  the  stone. 

The  battle-fields  were  pretty  close  together.  The  Malakoff 
tower  is  on  a  hill  which  is  right  in  the  edge  of  the  town.  The 
Redan  was  within  rifle-shot  of  the  Malakoff;  Inkerman  was 
a  mile  away;  and  Balaklava  removed  but  an  hour's  ride.  The 
French  trenches,  by  which  they  approached  and  invested  the 
Malakoff,  were  carried  so  close  under  its  sloping  sides  that 
one  might  have  stood  by  the  Russian  guns  and  tossed  a  stone 
into  them.  Repeatedly,  during  three  terrible  days,  they 
swarmed  up  the  little  Malakoff  hill,  and  were  beaten  back 
with  terrible  slaughter.  Finally,  they  captured  the  place,  and 
drove  the  Russians  out,  who  then  tried  to  retreat  into  the  town, 
but  the  English  had  taken  the  Redan,  and  shut  them  off  with 
a  wall  of  flame;  there  was  nothing  for  them  to  do  but  go 
back  and  retake  the  Malakoff  or  die  under  its  guns.  They 
did  go  back ;  they  took  the  Malakoff  and  retook  it  two  or  three 
times,  but  their  desperate  valor  could  not  avail,  and  they  had 
to  give  up  at  last. 

These  fearful  fields,  where  such  tempests  of  death  used  to 
rage,  are  peaceful  enough  now ;  no  sound  is  heard,  hardly  a 
living  thing  moves  about  them,  they  are  lonely  and  silent — their 
desolation  is  complete. 


268  MARK  TWAIN 

There  was  nothing  else  to  do,  and  so  everybody  went  to 
hunting  relics.  They  have  stocked  the  ship  with  them.  They 
brought  them  from  the  Malakoff,  from  the  Redan,  Inkerman, 
Balaklava — everywhere.  They  have  brought  cannon-balls, 
broken  ramrods,  fragments  of  shell — iron  enough  to  freight  a 
sloop.  Some  have  even  brought  bones — brought  them  labo 
riously  from  great  distances,  and  were  grieved  to  hear  the 
surgeon  pronounce  them  only  bones  of  mules  and  oxen.  I 
knew  Blucher  would  not  lose  an  opportunity  like  this.  He 
brought  a  sack  full  on  board  and  was  going  for  another.  I 
prevailed  upon  him  not  to  go.  He  has  already  turned  his 
stateroom  into  a  museum  of  worthless  trumpery,  which  he  has 
gathered  up  in  his  travels.  He  is  labeling  his  trophies,  now, 
I  picked  up  one  a  while  ago,  and  found  it  marked  "Fragment 
of  a  Russian  General."  I  carried  it  out  to  get  a  better  light 
upon  it — it  was  nothing  but  a  couple  of  teeth  and  part  of  the 
jawbone  of  a  horse.  I  said  with  some  asperity: 

"Fragment  of  a  Russian  General !  This  is  absurd.  Are 
you  never  going  to  learn  any  sense?" 

He  only  said:  "Go  slow — the  old  woman  won't  know  any 
different."  [His  aunt] 

This  person  gathers  mementoes  with  a  perfect  recklessness, 
nowadays;  mixes  them  all  up  together,  and  then  serenely 
labels  them  without  any  regard  to  truth,  propriety,  or  even 
plausibility.  I  have  found  him  breaking  a  stone  in  two,  and 
labeling  half  of  it  "Chunk  busted  from  the  pulpit  of  Demos 
thenes,"  and  the  other  half  "Dornick  from  the  Tomb  of  Abe- 
lard  and  Heloise."  I  have  known  him  to  gather  up  a  handful 
of  pebbles  by  the  roadside,  and  bring  them  on  board  ship  and 
label  them  as  coming  from  twenty  celebrated  localities  five 
hundrd  miles  apart.  I  remonstrate  against  these  outrages  upon 
reason  and  truth,  of  course,  but  it  does  no  good.  I  get  the 
same  tranquil,  unanswerable  reply  every  time: 

"It  don't  signify — the  old  woman  won't  know  any  different." 

Ever  since  we  three  or  four  fortunate  ones  made  the  mid 
night  trip  to  Athens,  it  has  afforded  him  genuine  satisfaction 
to  give  everybody  in  the  ship  a  pebble  from  the  Mars  Hill 
where  St.  Paul  preached.  He  got  all  those  pebbles  on  the  sea 
shore,  abreast  of  the  ship,  but  professes  to  have  gathered  them 
from  one  of  our  party.  However,  it  is  not  of  any  use  for  me 
to  expose  the  deception — it  affords  him  pleasure,  and  does  no 
harm  to  anybody.  He  says  he  never  expects  to  run  out  of 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  269 

mementoes  of  St.  Paul  as  long  as  he  is  in  reach  of  a  sand 
bank.  Well,  he  is  no  worse  than  others.  I  notice  that  all 
travelers  supply  deficiencies  in  their  collections  in  the  same 
way.  I  shall  never  have  any  confidence  in  such  things  again 
while  I  live. 


w 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

E  have  got  so  far  East  now—a  hundred  and  fifty-five 
degrees  of  longitude  from  San  Francisco — that  my 
watch  cannot  "keep  the  hang"  of  the  time  any  more. 
It  has  grown  discouraged,  and  stopped.  I  think  it  did  a  wise 
thing.  The  difference  in  time  between  Sebastopol  and  the 
Pacific  coast  is  enormous.  When  it  is  six  o'clock  in  the  morn 
ing  here,  it  is  somewhere  about  week  before  last  in  California. 
We  are  excusable  for  getting  a  little  tangled  as  to  time.  These 
distractions  and  distresses  about  the  time  have  worried  me  so 
much  that  I  was  afraid  my  mind  was  so  much  affected  that  I 
never  would  have  any  appreciation  of  time  again;  but  when  I 
noticed  how  handy  I  was  yet  about  comprehending  when  it  was 
dinner-time,  blessed  tranquillity  settled  down  upon  me,  and  I 
am  tortured  with  doubts  and  fears  no  more. 

Odessa  is  about  twenty  hours'  run  from  Sebastopol,  and 
is  the  most  northerly  port  in  the  Black  Sea.  We  came  here 
to  get  coal,  principally.  The  city  has  a  population  of  one 
hundred  and  thirty-three  thousand,  and  is  growing  faster  than 
any  other  small  city  out  of  America.  It  is  a  free  port,  and 
is  the  great  grain  mart  of  this  particular  part  of  the  world. 
Its  roadstead  is  full  of  ships.  Engineers  are  at  work,  now, 
turning  the  open  roadstead  into  a  spacious  artificial  harbor.  It 
is  to  be  almost  inclosed  by  massive  stone  piers,  one  of  which 
will  extend  into  the  sea  over  three  thousand  feet  in  a  straight 
ling. 

Qjiave  not  felt  so  much  at  home  for  a  long  time  as  I  did 
when  I  "raised  the  hill"  and  stood  in  Odessa  for  the  first  time. 
It  looked  just  like  an  American  city;  fine,  broad  streets,  and 
straight  as  well;  low  houses  (two  or  three  stories),  wide,  neat, 
and  free  from  any  quaintness  of  architectural  ornamentation; 

'  locust  trees  bordering  the  sidewalks  (they  call  them  acacias)  ; 

;  a  stirring,  business  look  about  the  streets  and  the  stores ;  fast 
walkers ;  a  familiar  new  look  about  the  houses  and  everything ; 
yea,  and  a  driving  and  smothering  cloud  of  dust  that  was  so 
like  a  message  from  our  Own  dear  native  land  that  we  could 
hardly  refrain  from  shedding  a  few  grateful  tears  and  execra- 

270 


. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  271 

^M 

tions  in  the  old  time-honored  American  way.^  Look  up  the 
street  or  dpwn  the  street,  this  way  or  that  way,  -we  saw  only 
America !  /.There  was  not  one  thing  to  remind  us  that  we  were 
in  Russia.  ~We  walked  for  some  little  distance,  reveling  in  this 
home  vision,  and  then  we  came  upon  a  church  and  a  hack- 
driver,  and  presto!  the  illusion  vanished!""*) The  church  had  a 
slender-spired  dome  that  rounded  inward  at/ its  base,  and  looked 
like  a  turnip  turned  upside  down,  and  the  hackman  seemed  to 
be  dressed  in  a  long  petticoat  without  any  hoops.  These  things 
were  essentially  foreign,  and  so  were  the  carriages — but  every 
body  knows  about  these  things,  and  there  is  no  occasion  for 
my  describing  them. 

We  were  only  to  stay  here  a  day  and  a  night  and  take  in 
coal ;  we  consulted  the  guide-books  and  were  rejoiced  to  know 
that  there  were  no  sights  in  Odessa  to  see ;  and  so  we  had  one 
good,  untrammeled  holiday  on  our  hands,  with  nothing  to  do 
but  idle  about  the  city  and  enjoy  ourselves.  We  sauntered 
through  the  markets  and  criticized  the  fearful  and  wonderful 
costumes  from  the  back  country;  examined  the  populace  as 
far  as  eyes  could  do  it;  and  closed  the  entertainment  with  an 
ice-cream  debauch.  We  do  not  get  ice-cream  everywhere,  and 
so,  when  we  do,  we  are  apt  to  dissipate  to  excess.  We  never 
cared  anything  about  ice-cream  at  home,  but  we  look  upon  it 
with  a  sort  of  idolatry  now  that  it  is  so  scarce  in  these  red-hot 
climates  of  the  East. 

Wre  only  found  two  pieces  of  statuary,  and  this  was  another 
blessing.  One  was  a  bronze  image  of  the  Due  de  Richelieu, 
grandnephew  of  the  splendid  Cardinal.  It  stood  in  a  spacious, 
handsome  promenade,  overlooking  the  sea,  and  from  its  base 
a  vast  flight  of  stone  steps  led  down  to  the  harbor — two  hun 
dred  of  them,  fifty  feet  long,  and  a  wide  landing  at  the  bottom 
of  every  twenty.  It  is  a  noble  staircase  and  from  a  distance 
the  people  toiling  up  it  looked  like  insects.  I  mention  this 
statue  and  this  stairway  because  they  have  their  story.  Riche 
lieu  founded  Odessa — watched  over  it  with  paternal  care — 
labored  with  a  fertile  brain  and  a  wise  understanding  for  its 
best  interests — spent  his  fortune  freely  to  the  same  end — en 
dowed  it  with' a  sound  prosperity,  and  one  which  will  yet  make 
it  one  of  the  great  cities  of  the  Old  World — built  this  noble 
stairway  with  money  from  his  own  private  purse — and — 
Well,  the  people  for  whom  he  had  done  so  much  let  him  walk 
down  these  same  steps,  one  day,  unattended,  old,  poor,  without 
a  second  coat  to  his  back;  and  when,  years  afterward,  he  died 


272  MARK  TWAIN 

in  Sevastopol  in  poverty  and  neglect,  they  called  a  meeting, 
subscribed  liberally,  and  immediately  erected  this  tasteful  mon 
ument  to  his  memory,  and  named  a  great  street  after  him.  It 
reminds  me  of  what  Robert  Burns's  mother  said  when  they 
erected  a  stately  monument  to  his  memory:  "Ah,  Robbie,  ye 
asked  them  for  bread  and  they  hae  gi'en  ye  a  stane." 

The  people  of  Odessa  have  warmly  recommended  us  to  go 
and  call  on  the  Emperor,  as  did  the  Sebastopolians.  They 
have  telegraphed  his  Majesty,  and  he  has  signified  his  willing 
ness  to  grant  us  an  audience.  So  we  are  getting  up  the  anchors 
and  preparing  to  sail  to  his  watering-place.  What  a  scratching 
around  there  will  be  now !  what  a  holding  of  important  meet 
ings  and  appointing  of  solemn  committees ! — and  what  a  fur 
bishing  up  of  claw-hammer  coats  and  white  silk  neckties !  As 
this  fearful  ordeal  we  are  about  to  pass  through  pictures  itself 
to  my  fancy  in  all  its  dread  sublimity,  I  begin  to  feel  my  fierce 
desire  to  converse  with  a  genuine  Emperor  cooling  down  and 
passing  away.  What  am  I  to  do  with  my  hands?  What  am 
I  to  do  with  my  feet?  What  in  the  world  am  I  to  do  with 
myself  ? 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

T  If  TE  anchored  here  at  Yalta,  Russia,  two  or  three  days 
\  \/  ag°-  To  me  the  place  was  a  vision  of  the  Sierras. 
The  tall,  gray  mountains  that  back  it,  their  sides  brist 
ling  with  pines — cloven  with  ravines — here  and  there  a  hoary 
rock  towering  into  view — long,  straight  streaks  sweeping  down 
from  the  summit  to  the  sea,  marking  the  passage  of  some  ava 
lanche  of  former  times — all  these  were  as  like  what  one  sees 
in  the  Sierras  as  if  the  one  were  a  portrait  of  the  other.  The 
little  village  of  Yalta  nestles  at  the  foot  of  an  amphitheater 
which  slopes  backward  and  upward  to  the  wall  of  hills,  and 
looks  as  if  it  might  have  sunk  quietly  down  to  its  present  posi 
tion  from  a  higher  elevation.  This  depression  is  covered  with 
the  great  parks  and  gardens  of  noblemen,  and  through  the  mass 
of  green  foliage  the  bright  colors  of  their  palaces  bud  out  here 
and  there  like  flowers.  It  is  a  beautiful  spot. 

We  had  the  United  States  consul  on  board — the  Odessa  con 
sul.  We  assembled  in  the  cabin  and  commanded  him  to  tell 
us  what  we  must  do  to  be  saved,  and  tell  us  quickly.  He  made 
a  speech.  The  first  thing  he  said  fell  like  a  blight  on  every 
hopeful  spirit;  he  had  never  seen  a  court  reception.  (Three 
groans  for  the  consul.)  But  he  said  he  had  seen  receptions  at 
the  Governor-General's  in  Odessa,  and  had  often  listened  to 
people's  experiences  of  receptions  at  the  Russian  and  other 
courts,  and  believed  he  knew  very  well  what  sort  of  ordeal  we 
were  about  to  essay.  (Hope  budded  again.)  He  said  we  were 
many ;  the  summer-place  was  small — a  mere  mansion ;  doubt 
less  we  should  be  received  in  summer  fashion — in  the  garden; 
we  would  stand  in  a  row,  all  the  gentlemen  in  swallow-tail 
coats,  white  kids,  and  white  neckties,  and  the  ladies  in  light- 
colored  silks,  or  something  of  that  kind ;  at  the  proper  moment 
— 12  meridian — the  Emperor,  attended  by  his  suite  arrayed  in 
splendid  uniforms,  would  appear  and  walk  slowly  along  the 
line,  bowing  to  some,  and  saying  two  or  three  words  to  others. 
At  the  moment  his  Majesty  appeared,  a  universal,  delighted, 
enthusiastic  smile  ought  to  break  out  like  a  rash  among  the 
passengers — a  smile  of  love,  of  gratification,  of  admiration — 
and  with  one  accord,  the  party  must  begin  to  bow — not  ob- 

273 


274  MARK  TWAIN 

sequiously,  but  respectfully,  and  with  dignity;  at  the  end  of 
fifteen  minutes  the  Emperor  would  go  in  the  house,  and  we 
could  run  along  home  again.  We  felt  immensely  relieved.  It 
seemed,  in  a  manner,  easy.  There  was  not  a  man  in  the  party 
but  believed  that  with  a  little  practice  he  could  stand  in  a  row, 
especially  if  there  were  others  along;  there  was  not  a  man  but 
believed  he  could  bow  without  tripping  on  his  coat-tail  and 
breaking  his  neck ;  in  a  word,  we  came  to  believe  we  were  equal 
to  any  item  in  the  performance  except  that  complicated  smile. 
The  consul  also  said  we  ought  to  draft  a  little  address  to  the 
Emperor,  and  present  it  to  one  of  his  aides-de-camp,  who 
would  forward  it  to  him  at  the  proper  time.  Therefore,  five 
gentlemen  were  appointed  to  prepare  the  document,  and  the 
fifty  others  went  sadly  smiling  about  the  ship — practising. 
During  the  next  twelve  hours  we  had  the  general  appearance, 
somehow,  of  being  at  a  funeral,  where  everybody  was  sorry 
the  death  had  occurred,  but  glad  it  was  over — where  every 
body  was  smiling,  and  yet  broken-hearted. 

A  committee  went  ashore  to  wait  on  his  Excellency,  the  Gov 
ernor-General,  and  learn  our  fate.  At  the  end  of  three  hours 
of  boding  suspense,  they  came  back  and  said  the  Emperor 
would  receive  us  at  noon  the  next  day — would  send  carriages 
for  us — would  hear  the  address  in  person.  The  Grand  Duke 
Michael  had  sent  to  invite  us  to  his  palace  also.  Any  man 
could  see  that  there  was  an  intention  here  to  show  that  Russia's 
friendship  for  America  was  so  genuine  as  to  render  even  her 
private  citizens  objects  worthy  of  kindly  attentions. 

At  the  appointed  hour  we  drove  out  three  miles  and  as 
sembled  in  the  handsome  garden  in  front  of  the  Emperor's 
palace. 

We  formed  a  circle  under  the  trees  before  the  door,  for 
there  was  no  room  in  the  house  able  to  accommodate  our  three 
score  persons  comfortably,  and  in  a  few  minutes  the  imperial 
family  came  out  bowing  and  smiling,  and  stood  in  our  midst. 
A  number  of  great  dignitaries  of  the  empire,  in  undress  uni 
forms,  came  with  them.  With  every  bow,  his  Majesty  said 
a  word  of  welcome.  I  copy  these  speeches.  There  is  char 
acter  in  them — Russian  character — which  is  politeness  itself, 
and  the  genuine  article.  The  French  are  polite,  but  it  is  often 
mere  ceremonious  politeness.  A  Russian  imbues  his  polite 
things  with  a  heartiness,  both  of  phrase  and  expression,  that 
compels  belief  in  their  sincerity.  As  I  was  saying,  the  Czar 
punctuated  his  speeches  with  bows : 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  275 

"Good  morning — I  am  glad  to  see  you — I  am  gratified — I 
am  delighted — I  am  happy  to  receive  you !" 

All  took  off  their  hats,  and  the  consul  inflicted  the  address  on 
him.  He  bore  it  with  unflinching  fortitude;  then  took  the 
rusty-looking  document  and  handed  it  to  some  great  officer  or 
other,  to  be  filed  away  among  the  archives  of  Russia — in  the 
stove.  He  thanked  us  for  the  address,  and  said  he  was  very 
much  pleased  to  see  us,  especially  as  such  friendly  relations 
existed  between  Russia  and  the  United  States.  The  Empress 
said  the  Americans  were  favorites  in  Russia,  and  she  hoped 
the  Russians  were  similarly  regarded  in  America.  These  were 
all  the  speeches  that  were  made,  and  I  recommend  them  to 
parties  who  present  policemen  with  gold  watches,  as  models  of 
brevity  and  point.  After  this  the  Empress  went  and  talked 
sociably  (for  an  Empress)  with  various  ladies  around  the 
circle;  several  gentlemen  entered  into  a  disjointed  general  con 
versation  with  the  Emperor ;  the  Dukes  and  Princes,  Admirals 
and  Maids  of  Honor  dropped  into  free-and-easy  chat  with  first 
one  and  then  another  of  our  party,  and  whoever  chose  stepped 
forward  and  spoke  with  the  modest  little  Grand  Duchess 
Marie,  the  Czar's  daughter.  She  is  fourteen  years  old,  light- 
haired,  blue-eyed,  unassuming,  and  pretty.  Everybody  talks 
English. 

The  Emperor  wore  a  cap,  frock-coat,  and  pantaloons,  all  of 
some  kind  of  plain  white  drilling — cotton  or  linen — and  sported 
no  jewelry  or  any  insignia  whatever  of  rank.  No  costume 
could  be  less  ostentatious.  He  is  very  tall  and  spare,  and  a 
determined-looking  man,  though  a  very  pleasant-looking  one, 
nevertheless.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  he  is  kind  and  affectionate. 
There  is  something  very  noble  in  his  expression  when  his  cap 
is  off.  There  is  none  of  that  cunning  in  his  eye  that  all  of  us 
noticed  in  Louis  Napoleon's. 

The  Empress  and  the  little  Grand  Duchess  wore  simple  suits 
of  foulard  (or  foulard  silk,  I  don't  know  which  is  proper), 
with  a  small  blue  spot  in  it;  the  dresses  were  trimmed  with 
blue ;  both  ladies  wore  broad  blue  sashes  about  their  waists ; 
linen  collars  and  clerical  ties  of  muslin;  low-crowned  straw 
hats  trimmed  with  blue  velvet;  parasols  and  flesh-colored 
gloves.  The  Grand  Duchess  had  no  heels  on  her  shoes.  I 
do  not  know  this  of  my  own  knowledge,  but  one  of  our  ladies 
told  me  so.  I  was  not  looking  at  her  shoes.  I  was  glad  to 
observe  that  she  wore  her  own  hair,  plaited  in  thick  braids 
against  the  back  of  her  head,  instead  of  the  uncomely  thing 


2/6  MARK  TWAIN 

they  call  a  waterfall,  which  is  about  as  much  like  a  waterfall 
as  a  canvas-covered  ham  is  like  a  cataract.  Taking  the  kind 
expression  that  is  in  the  Emperor's  face  and  the  gentleness 
that  is  in  his  young  daughter's  into  consideration,  I  wondered 
if  it  would  not  tax  the  Czar's  firmness  to  the  utmost  to  con 
demn  a  supplicating  wretch  to  misery  in  the  wastes  of  Siberia 
if  she  pleaded  for  him.  Every  time  their  eyes  met,  I  saw  more 
and  more  what  a  tremendous  power  that  weak,  diffident  school 
girl  could  wield  if  she  chose  to  do  it.  Many  and  many  a  time 
she  might  rule  the  Autocrat  of  Russia,  whose  lightest  word 
is  law  to  seventy  millions  of  human  beings!  She  was  only  a 
girl,  and  she  looked  like  a  thousand  others  I  have  seen,  but 
never  a  girl  provoked  such  a  novel  and  peculiar  interest  in  me 
before.  A  strange,  new  sensation  is  a  rare  thing  in  this  hum 
drum  life,  and  I  had  it  here.  There  was  nothing  stale  or  worn 
out  about  the  thoughts  and  feelings  the  situation  and  the  cir 
cumstances  created.  It  seemed  strange — stranger  than  I  can 
tell — to  think  that  the  central  figure,  in  the  cluster  of  men  and 
women,  chatting  here  under  the  trees  like  the  most  ordinary 
individual  in  the  land,  was  a  man  who  could  open  his  lips  and 
ships  would  fly  through  the  waves,  locomotives  would  speed 
over  the  plains,  couriers  would  hurry  from  village  to  village, 
a  hundred  telegraphs  would  flash  the  word  to  the  four  corners 
of  an  empire  that  stretches  its  vast  proportions  over  a  seventh 
part  of  the  habitable  globe,  and  a  countless  multitude  of  men 
would  spring  to  do  his  bidding.  I  had  a  sort  of  vague  desire 
to  examine  his  hands  and  see  if  they  were  of  flesh  and  blood, 
like  other  men's.  Here  was  a  man  who  could  do  this  wonder 
ful  thing,  and  yet  if  I  chose  I  could  knock  him  down.  The 
case  was  plain,  but  it  seemed  preposterous,  nevertheless—as 
preposterous  as  trying  to  knock  down  a  mountain  or  wipe  out 
a  continent.  If  this  man  sprained  his  ankle,  a  million  miles  ; 
of  telegraph  would  carry  the  news  over  mountains — valleys — 
uninhabited  deserts— under  the  trackless  sea— and  ten  thou 
sand  newspapers  would  prate  of  it;  if  he  were  grievously  ill, 
all  the  nations  would  know  it  before  the  sun  rose  again;  if 
he  dropped  lifeless  where  he  stood,  his  fall  might  shake  the 
thrones  of  half  a  world!  If  I  could  have  stolen  his  coat,  I 
would  have  done  it.  When  I  meet  a  man  like  that,  I  want 
something  to  remember  him  by. 

As  a  general  thing,  we  have  been  shown  through  palaces  by 
some  plush-legged,  filigreed  flunky  or  other,  who  charged  a 
franc  for  it;  but  after  talking  with  the  company  half  an  hour, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  277, 

the  Emperor  of  Russia  and  his  family  conducted  us  all  through 
their  mansion  themselves.  They  made  no  charge.  They 
seemed  to  take  a  real  pleasure  in  it. 

We  spent  half  an  hour  idling  through  the  palace,  admiring 
the  cozy  apartments  and  the  rich  but  eminently  homelike  ap 
pointments  of  the  place,  and  then  the  imperial  family  bade 
our  party  a  kind  good-by,  and  proceeded  to  count  the  spoons. 

An  invitation  was  extended  to  us  to  visit  the  palace  of  the 
eldest  son,  the  Crown  Prince  of  Russia,  which  was  near  at 
hand.  The  young  man  was  absent,  but  the  Dukes  and  Count 
esses  and  Princes  went  over  the  premises  with  us  as  leisurely 
as  was  the  case  at  the  Emperor's,  and  conversation  continued 
as  lively  as  ever. 

It  was  a  little  after  one  o'clock  now.  We  drove  to  the 
Grand  Duke  Michael's,  a  mile  away,  in  response  to  his  invita 
tion,  previously  given. 

.  We  arrived  in  twenty  minutes  from  the  Emperor's.  It  is  a 
lovely  place.  The  beautiful  palace  nestles  among  the  grand  old 
groves  of  the  park,  the  park  sits  in  the  lap  of  the  picturesque 
crags  and  hills,  and  both  look  out  upon  the  breezy  ocean.  In 
the  park  are  rustic  seats,  here  and  there,  in  secluded  nooks  that 
are  dark  with  shade;  there  are  rivulets  of  crystal  water;  there 
are  lakelets,  with  inviting,  grassy  banks ;  there  are  glimpses  of 
sparkling  cascades  through  openings  in  the  wilderness  of 
foliage;  there  are  streams  of  clear  water  gushing  from  mimic 
knots  on  the  trunks  of  forest  trees ;  there  are  miniature  marble 
temples  perched  upon  gray  old  crags;  there  are  airy  lookouts 
whence  one  may  gaze  upon  a  broad  expanse  of  landscape  and 
ocean.  The  palace  is  modeled  after  the  choicest  forms  of 
Grecian  architecture,  and  its  wide  colonnades  surround  a  cen 
tral  court  that  is  banked  with  rare  flowers  that  fill  the  place 
with  their  fragrance,  and  in  their  midst  springs  a  fountain  that 
cools  the  summer  air,  and  may  possibly  breed  mosquitoes,  but 
I  do  not  think  it  does. 

The  Grand  Duke  and  his  Duchess  came  out,  and  the  presen 
tation  ceremonies  were  as  simple  as  they  had  been  at  the  Em 
peror's.  In  a  few  minutes,  conversation  was  under  way,  as 
before.  The  Empress  appeared  in  the  veranda,  and  the  little 
Grand  Duchess  came  out  into  the  crowd.  They  had  beaten  us 
there.  In  a  few  minutes,  the  Emperor  came  himself  on  horse 
back.  It  was  very  pleasant.  You  can  appreciate  it  if  you  have 
ever  visited  royalty  and  felt  occasionally  that  possibly  you 
might  be  wearing  out  your  welcome — though  as  a  general 


278  MARK  TWAIN 

thing,  I  believe,  royalty  is  not  scrupulous  about  discharging 
you  when  it  is  done  with  you. 

The  Grand  Duke  is  the  third  brother  of  the  Emperor,  is 
about  thirty-seven  years  old,  perhaps,  and  is  the  princeliest 
figure  in  Russia.  He  is  even  taller  than  the  Czar,  as  straight 
as  an  Indian,  and  bears  himself  like  one  of  those  gorgeous 
knights  we  read  about  in  romances  of  the  Crusades.  He  looks 
like  a  great-hearted  fellow  who  would  pitch  an  enemy  into 
the  river  in  a  moment,  and  then  jump  in  and  risk  his  life  fish 
ing  him  out  again.  The  stories  they  tell  of  him  show  him  to 
be  of  a  brave  and  generous  nature.  He  must  have  been  de 
sirous  of  proving  that  Americans  were  welcome  guests  in  the 
imperial  palaces  of  Russia,  because  he  rode  all  the  way  to 
Yalta  and  escorted  our  procession  to  the  Emperor's  himself , 
and  kept  his  aides  scurrying  about,  clearing  the  road  and  offer 
ing  assistance  wherever  it  could  be  needed.  We  were  rather 
familiar  with  him  then,  because  we  did  not  know  who  he  was. 
We  recognized  him  now,  and  appreciated  the  friendly  spirit 
that  prompted  him  to  do  us  a  favor  that  any  other  Grand 
Duke  in  the  world  would  have  doubtless  declined  to  do.  He 
had  plenty  of  servitors  whom  he  could  have  sent,  but  he  chose 
to  attend  to  the  matter  himself. 

The  Grand  Duke  was  dressed  in  the  handsome  and  showy 
uniform  of  a  Cossack  officer.  The  Grand  Duchess  had  on  a 
white  alpaca  robe,  with  the  seams  and  gores  trimmed  with  black 
barb  lace,  and  a  little  gray  hat  with  a  feather  of  the  same  color. 
She  is  young,  rather  pretty,  modest  and  unpretending,  and  full 
of  winning  politeness. 

Our  party  walked  all  through  the  house,  and  then  the  no 
bility  escorted  them  all  over  the  grounds,  and  finally  brought 
them  back  to  the  palace  about  half  past  two  o'clock  to  break 
fast.  They  called  it  breakfast,  but  we  would  have  called  itj 
luncheon.  It  consisted  of  two  kinds  of  wine;  tea,  bread, 
cheese,  and  cold  meats,  and  was  served  on  the  center-tables  in 
the  reception-room  and  the  verandas — anywhere  that  was  con 
venient;  there  was  no  ceremony.  It  was  a  sort  of  picnic.  I 
had  heard  before  that  we  were  to  breakfast  there,  but  Blucher 
said  he  believed  Baker's  boy  had  suggested  it  to  his  Imperial 
Highness.  I  think  not — though  it  would  be  like  him.  Baker's 
boy  is  the  famine-breeder  of  the  ship.  He  is  always  hungry. 
They  say  he  goes  about  the  staterooms  when  the  passengers 
are  out,  and  eats  up  all  the  soap.  And  they  say  he  eats  oakum. 
They  say  he  will  eat  anything  he  can  get  between  meals,  but 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  279 

he  prefers  oakum.  He  does  not  like  oakum  for  dinner,  but 
he  likes  it  for  lunch,  at  odd  hours,  or  anything  that  way.  It 
makes  him  very  disagreeable,  because  it  makes  his  breath  bad, 
and  keeps  his  teeth  all  stuck  up  with  tar.  Baker's  boy  may 
have  suggested  the  breakfast,  but  I  hope  he  did  not.  It  went 
off  well,  anyhow.  The  illustrious  host  moved  about  from  place 
to  place,  and  helped  to  destroy  the  provisions  and  keep  the 
conversation  lively,  and  the  Grand  Duchess  talked  with  the 
veranda  parties  and  such  as  had  satisfied  their  appetites  and 
straggled  out  from  the  reception-room. 

The  Grand  Duke's  tea  was  delicious.  They  give  one  a 
lemon  to  squeeze  into  it,  or  iced  milk,  if  he  prefers  it.  The 
former  is  best.  This  tea  is  brought  overland  from  China.  It 
injures  the  article  to  transport  it  by  sea. 

When  it  was  time  to  go,  we  bade  our  distinguished  hosts 
good-by,  and  they  retired  happy  and  contented  to  their  apart 
ments  to  count  their  spoons. 

We  had  spent  the  best  part  of  half  a  day  in  the  home  of 
royalty,  and  had  been  as  cheerful  and  comfortable  all  the  time 
as  we  could  have  been  in  the  ship.  I  would  as  soon  have 
thought  of  being  cheerful  in  Abraham's  bosom  as  in  the  palace 
of  an  Emperor.  I  supposed  that  Emperors  were  terrible  peo 
ple.  I  thought  they  never  did  anything  but  wear  magnificent 
crowns  and  red  velvet  dressing-gowns  with  dabs  of  wool  sewed 
on  them  in  spots,  and  sit  on  thrones  and  scowl  at  the  flunkies 
and  the  people  in  the  parquette,  and  order  Dukes  and  Duch 
esses  off  to  execution.  I  find,  however,  that  when  one  is  so 
fortunate  as  to  get  behind  the  scenes  and  see  them  at  home 
and  in  the  privacy  of  their  firesides,  they  are  strangely  like 
common  mortals.  They  are  pleasanter  to  look  upon  then  than 
they  are  in  their  theatrical  aspect.  It  seems  to  come  as  natural 
to  them  to  dress  and  act  like  other  people  as  it  is  to  put  a 
friend's  cedar  pencil  in  your  pocket  when  you  are  done  using  it. 
But  I  can  never  have  any  confidence  in  the  tinsel  kings  of  the 
theater  after  this.  It  will  be  a  great  loss.  I  used  to  take  such 
a  thrilling  pleasure  in  them.  But,  hereafter,  I  will  turn  me 
sadly  away  and  say: 

"This  does  not  answer — this  isn't  the  style  of  king  that  / 
am  acquainted  with." 

When  they  swagger  around  the  stage  in  jeweled  crowns  and 
splendid  robes,  I  shall  feel  bound  to  observe  that  all  the  Em 
perors  that  ever  /  was  personally  acquainted  with  wore  the 
commonest  sort  of  clothes,  and  did  not  swagger.  And  when 


280  MARK  TWAIN 

they  come  on  the  stage  attended  by  a  vast  body-guard  of  supes 
in  helmets  and  tin  breastplates,  it  will  be  my  duty  as  well  as 
my  pleasure  to  inform  the  ignorant  that  no  crowned  head  of 
my  acquaintance  has  a  soldier  anywhere  about  his  house  or 
his  person. 

Possibly  it  may  be  thought  that  our  party  tarried  too  long-, 
or  did  other  improper  things,  but  such  was  not  the  case.  The 
company  felt  that  they  were  occupying  an  unusually  responsible 
position — they  were  representing  the  people  of  America,  not 
the  government — arid  therefore  they  were  careful  to  do  their 
best  to  perform  their  high  mission  with  credit. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Imperial  families,  no  doubt,  con 
sidered  that  in  entertaining  us  they  were  more  especially  en 
tertaining  the  people  of  America  than  they  could  by  showering 
attentions  on  a  whole  platoon  of  ministers  plenipotentiary;  and 
therefore  they  gave  to  the  event  its  fullest  significance,  as  an 
expression  of  good  will  and  friendly  feeling  toward  the  entire 
country.  We  took  the  kindnesses  we  received  as  attentions 
thus  directed,  of  course,  and  not  to  ourselves  as  a  party.  That 
we  felt  a  personal  pride  in  being  received  as  the  representatives 
of  a  nation,  we  do  not  deny;  that  we  felt  a  national  pride  in 
the  warm  cordiality  of  the  reception,  cannot  be  doubted. 

Our  poet  has  been  rigidly  suppressed,  from  the  time  we 
let  go  the  anchor.  When  it  was  announced  that  we  were  going 
to  visit  the  Emperor  of  Russia,  the  fountains  of  his  great 
deep  were  broken  up,  and  he  rained  ineffable  bosh  for  four- 
and-twenty  hours.  Our  original  anxiety  as  to  what  we  were 
going  to  do  with  ourselves,  was  suddenly  transformed  into 
anxiety  about  what  we  were  going  to  do  with  our  poet. 
The  problem  was  solved  at  last.  Two  alternatives  were  offered 
him — he  must  either  swear  a  dreadful  oath  that  he  would  not 
issue  a  line  of  his  poetry  while  he  was  in  the  Czar's  dominions,1 
or  else  remain  under  guard  on  board  the  ship  until  we  were 
safe  at  Constantinople  again.  He  fought  the  dilemma  long, 
but  yielded  at  last.  It  was  a  great  deliverance.  Perhaps  the. 
savage  reader  would  like  a  specimen  of  his  style.  I  do  not 
mean  this  term  to  be  offensive.  I  only  use  it  because  "the  gentle 
reader"  has  been  used  so  often  that  any  change  from  it  cannot 
but  be  refreshing  : 

Save  us  and  sanctify  us,  and  finally,  then, 

See  good  provisions  "we  enjoy  while  we  journey  to  Jerusafcm. 

For  so  man  proposes,  which  it  is  most  true, 

And  time  will  wait  for  none,  nor  for  us  too. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  281 

The  sea  has  been  unusually  rough  all  day.  However,  we 
have  had  a  lively  time  of  it,  anyhow.  We  have  had  quite  a  run 
of  visitors.  The  Governor-General  came,  and  we  received 
him  with  a  salute  of  nine  guns.  He  brought  his  family  with 
him.  I  observed  that  carpets  were  spread  from  the  pierhead 
to  his  carriage  for  him  to  walk  on,  though  I  have  seen  him 
walk  there  without  any  carpet  when  he  was  not  on  business. 
I  thought  maybe  he  had  what  the  accidental  insurance  people 
might  call  an  extra-hazardous  polish  ("policy" — joke,  but  not 
above  mediocrity)  on  his  boots,  and  wished  to  protect  them, 
but  I  examined  and  could  not  see  that  they  were  blacked  any 
better  than  usual.  It  may  have  been  that  he  had  forgotten 
his  carpet  before,  but  he  did  not  have  it  with  him,  anyhow.  He 
was  an  exceedingly  pleasant  old  gentleman;  we  all  liked  him, 
especially  Blucher.  When  he  went  away,  Blucher  invited  him 
to  come  again  and  fetch  his  carpet  along. 

Prince  Dolgorouki  and  a  Grand  Admiral  or  two,  whom  we 
had  seen  yesterday  at  the  reception,  came  on  board  also.  I 
was  a  little  distant  with  these  parties,  at  first,  because  when  I 
have  been  visiting  Emperors  I  do  not  like  to  be  too  familiar 
with  people  I  only  know  by  reputation,  and  whose  moral  char 
acters  and  standing  in  society  I  cannot  be  thoroughly  ac 
quainted  with.  I  judged  it  best  to  be  a  little  offish,  at  first. 
I  said  to  myself,  Princes  and  Counts  and  Grand  Admirals 
are  very  well,  but  they  are  not  Emperors,  and  one  cannot  be 
too  particular  about  whom  he  associates  with. 

Baron  Wrangel  came,  also.  He  used  to  be  a  Russian  Am 
bassador  at  Washington.  I  told  him  I  had  an  uncle  who  fell 
down  a  shaft  and  broke  himself  in  two,  as  much  as  a  year 
before  that.  That  was  a  falsehood,  but  then  I  was  not  going  to 
let  any  man  eclipse  me  on  surprising  adventures,  merely  far 
the  want  of  a  little  invention.  The  Baron  is  a  fine  man,  and 
is  said  to  stand  high  in  the  Emperor's  confidence  and  esteem. 

Baron  Ungern-Sternberg,  a  boisterous,  whole-souled  old 
nobleman,  came  with  the  rest.  He  is  a  man  of  progress  and 
enterprise — a  representative  man  of  the  age.  He  is  the  Chief 
Director  of  the  railway  system  of  Russia — a  sort  of  railroad 
king.  In  his  line  he  is  making  things  move  along  in  this 
country.  He  has  traveled  extensively  in  America.  He  says 
he  has  tried  convict  labor  on  his  railroads,  and  with  perfect 
success.  He  says  the  convicts  work  well,  and  are  quiet  and 
peaceable.  He  observed  that  he  employs  nearly  ten  thousand 
of  them  now.  This  appeared  to  be  another  call  on  my  re- 


282  MARK  TWAIN 

sources.  I  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  I  said  we  had  eighty 
thousand  convicts  employed  on  the  railways  in  America — 
all  of  them  under  sentence  of  death  for  murder  in  the  first 
degree.  That  closed  him  out.  We  had  General  Todleben  (the 
famous  defender  of  Sebastopol,  during  the  siege),  and  many 
inferior  army  and  also  navy  officers,  and  a  number  of  unofficial 
Russian  ladies  and  gentlemen.  Naturally,  a  champagne  lun 
cheon  was  in  order,  and  was  accomplished  without  loss  of 
life.  Toasts  and  jokes  were  discharged  freely,  but  no  speeches 
were  made  save  one  thanking  the  Emperor  and  the  Grand 
Duke,  through  the  Governor-General,  for  our  hospitable  re 
ception,  and  one  by  the  Governor-General  in  reply,  in  which  he 
returned  the  Emperor's  thanks  for  the  speech,  etc. 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

WE  returned  to  Constantinople,  and  after  a  day  or  two 
spent  in  exhausting  marches  about  the  city  and 
voyages  up  the  Golden  Horn  in  caiques,  we  steamed 
away  again.  We  passed  through  the  Sea  of  Marmora  and  the 
Dardanelles,  and  steered  for  a  new  land — a  new  one  to  us, 
at  least — Asia.  We  had  as  yet  only  acquired  a  bowing  ac 
quaintance  with  it,  through  pleasure  excursions  to  Scutari  and 
the  regions  round  about. 

We  passed  between  Lemnos  and  Mytilene,  and  saw  them  as 
we  hacl  seen  Elba  and  the  Balearic  Isles — mere  bulky  shapes, 
with  the  softening  mists  of  distance  upon  them — whales  in 
a  fog,  as  it  were.  Then  we  held  our  course  southward,  and 
began  to  "read  up"  celebrated  Smyrna. 

At  all  hours  of  the  day  and  night  the  sailors  in  the  forecastle 
amused  themselves  and  aggravated  us  by  burlesquing  our  visit 
to  royalty.  The  opening  paragraph  of  our  Address  to  the 
Emperor  was  framed  as  follows : 

"We  are  a  handful  of  private  citizens  of  America,  traveling 
simply  for  recreation — and  unostentatiously,  as  becomes  our 
unofficial  state — and,  therefore,  we  have  no  excuse  to  tender 
for  presenting  ourselves  before  your  Majesty,  save  the  desire 
of  offering  our  grateful  acknowledgments  to  the  lord  of  a 
realm  which,  through  good  and  through  evil  report,  has  been 
the  steadfast  friend  of  the  land  we  love  so  well." 

The  third  cook,  crowned  with  a  resplendent  tin  basin  and 
wrapped  royally  in  a  table-cloth  mottled  with  grease-spots 
and  coffee-stains,  and  bearing  a  scepter  that  looked  strangely 
like  a  belaying  pin,  walked  upon  a  dilapidated  carpet  and 
perched  himself  on  the  capstan,  careless  of  the  flying  spray; 
his  tarred  and  weather-beaten  Chamberlains,  Dukes,  and  Lord 
High  Admirals  surrounded  him,  arrayed  in  all  the  pomp  that 
spare  tarpaulins  and  remnants  of  old  sails  could  furnish. 
Then  the  visiting  "watch  below,"  transformed  into  graceless 
ladies  and  uncouth  pilgrims,  by  rude  travesties  upon  waterfalls, 
hoop-skirts,  white  kid  gloves,  and  swallow-tail  coats,  moved 
solemnly  up  the  companionway,  and  bowing  low,  began  a 

283 


284  MARK  TWAIN 

system  of   complicated  and  extraordinary  smiling  which   few 
monarchs  could  look  upon  and  live.     Then  the  mock  consul, 
a  slush-plastered  deck-sweep,  drew^  out  a  soiled  fragment  of 
paper  and  proceeded  to  read,  laboriously: 
1    "To    his    Imperial    Majesty,    Alexander    II.,    Emperor    of 

Russia : 

"We  are  a  handful  of  private  citizens  of  America,  traveling 
simply  for  recreation — and  unostentatiously,  as  becomes  our 
unofficial  state— and,  therefore,  we  have  no  excuse  to  tender 
for  presenting  ourselves  before  your  Majesty — " 

The  Emperor— "Then  what  the  devil  did  you  come  for  ?' 

"Save  the  desire  of  offering  our  grateful  acknowledgments 

to  the  lord  of  a  realm  which — " 

The  Emperor— "Oh,  d— n  the  Address !— read  it  to  the 
police.  Chamberlain,  take  these  people  over  to  my  brother, 
the  Grand  Duke's,  and  give  them  a  square  meal.  Adieu ! 
am  happy — I  am  grained — I  am  delighted — I  am  bored. 
Adieu,  adieu — vamose  the  ranch!  The  First  Groom  of  the 
Palace  will  proceed  to  count  the  portable  articles  of  value  be 
longing  to  the  premises." 

The  farce  then  closed,  to  be  repeated  again  with  every  change 
of  the  watches,  and  embellished  with  new  and  still  more  ex 
travagant  inventions  of  pomp  and  conversation. 

At  all  times  of  the  day  and  night  the  phraseology  of  that 
tiresome  address  fell  upon  our  ears.  Grimy  sailors  came  down 
oujt  of  the  foretop  placidly  announcing  themselves  as  "a 
handful  of  private  citizens  of  America,  traveling  simply  for 
recreation  and  unostentatiously,"  etc. ;  the  coal-passers  moved 
to  their  duties  -in  the  profound  depths  of  the  ship,  ex 
plaining  the  blackness  of  their  faces  and  their  uncouthness 
of  dress,  with  the  reminder  that- they  were  "a  handful  of 
private  citizens  of  America,  traveling  simply  for  recreation,  and 
when  the  cry  rang  through  the  vessel  at  midnight:  "EIGHT 
BELLS! — LARBOARD  WATCH,  TURN  OUT!"  the  larboard  watch 
came  gaping  and  stretching  out  of  their  den,  with  the  ever 
lasting  formula :  "Aye,  aye,  sir !  We  are  a  handful  of 
private  citizens  of  America,  traveling  simply  for  recreation, 
and  unostentatiously,  as  becomes  our  unofficial  state!" 

As  I  was  a  member  of  the  committee,  and  helped  to  frame 
the  Address,  these  sarcasms  came  home  to  me.  I  never  heard 
a  sailor  proclaiming  himself  as  a  handful  of  American  citizens 
traveling  for  recreation,  but  I  wished  he  might  trip  and  fall 
overboard,  and  so  reduce  his  handful  by  one  individual,  at 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  285 

least.  I  never  was  so  tired  of  any  one  phrase  as  the  sailors 
made  me  of  the  opening  sentence  of  the  Address  to  the 
Emperor  of  Russia. 

This  seaport  of  Smyrna,  our  first  notable  acquaintance  in 
Asia,  is  a  closely  packed  city  of  one  hundred  and  thirty 
thousand  inhabitants,  and,  like  Constantinople,  it  has  no  out 
skirts.  It  is  as  closely  packed  at  its  outer  edges  as  it  is 
in  the  center,  and  then  the  habitations  leave  suddenly  off  and 
the  plain  beyond  seems  houseless.  fit  is  just  like  any  other  * 
Oriental  city.  That  is  to  say,  its  Moslem  houses  are  heavy  \ 
and  dark,  and  as  comfortless  as  so  many  tombs ;  its  streets  are 
crooked,  rudely  and  roughly  paved,  and  as  narrow  as  an  ordi 
nary  staircase ;  the  streets  uniformly  carry  a  man  to  any  other 
place  than  the  one  he  wants  to  go  to,  and  surprise  him  by 
landing  him  in  the  most  unexpected  localities;  business  is 
chiefly  carried  on  in  great  covered  bazars,  celled  like  a  honey-  j  r 
comb  with  innumerable  shops  no  larger  than  a  common  closet, 
and  the  whole  hive  cut  up  into  a  maze  of  alleys  about  wide 
enough  to  accommodate  a  laden  camel,  and  well  calculated 
to  confuse  a  stranger  and  eventually  lose  him ;  everywhere 
there  is  dirt,  everywhere  there  are  fleas,  everywhere  there  are 
lean,  broken-hearted  dogs ;  every  alley  is  thronged  with  people ; 
wherever  you  look,  your  eye  rests  upon  a  wild  masquerade 
of  extravagant  costumes;  the  workshops  are  all  open  to  the 
streets,  and  the  workmen  visible;  all  manner  of  sounds  assail 
the  ear,  and  over  them  all  rings  out  the  muezzin's  cry  from 
some  tall  minaret,  calling  the  faithful  vagabonds  to  prayer; 
and  superior  to  the  call  to  prayer,  the  noises  in  the  streets, 
the  interest  of  the  costumes — superior  to  everything,  and 
claiming  the  bulk  of  attention  first,  last,  and  all  the  time — is  a 
combination  of  Mohammedan  stenches,  to  which  the  smell 
of  even  a  Chinese  quarter  would  be  as  pleasant  as  the  roasting 
odors  of  the  fatted  calf  to  the  nostrils  of  the  returning 
Prodigal.  Such  is  Oriental  luxury — such  is  Oriental  splendor !  J 
We  read  about  it  all  our  days,  but  we  comprehend  it  not  until 
we  see  it.  Smyrna  is  a  very  old  city.  Its  name  occurs  several 
times  in  the  Bible,  one  or  two  of  the  disciples  of  Christ  visited 
it,  and  here  was  located  one  of  the  original  seven  apocalyptic 
churches  spoken  of  in  Revelations.  These  churches  were 
symbolized  in  the  Scriptures  as  candlesticks,  and  on  certain 
conditions  there  was  a  sort  of  implied  promise  that  Smyrna 
should  be  endowed  with  a  "crown  of  life."  She  was  to  "be 
faithful  unto  death" — those  were  the  terms.  She  has  not  kept 


286  MARK  TWAIN 

up  her  faith  straight  along,  but  the  pilgrims  that  wander 
hither  consider  that  she  has  come  near  enough  to  it  to  save 
her,  and  so  they  point  to  the  fact  fhat  Smyrna  to-day  wears 
her  crown  of  life,  and  is  a  great  city,  with  a  great  commerce 
and  full  of  energy,  while  the  cities  wherein  were  located  the 
other  six  churches,  and  to  which  no  crown  of  life  was  prom 
ised,  have  vanished  from  the  earth.  So  Smyrna  really  still 
possesses  her  crown  of  life,  in  a  business  point  of  view.  Her 
career,  for  eighteen  centuries,  has  been  a  chequered  one,  and 
she  has  been  under  the  rule  of  princes  of  many  creeds,  yet 
there  has  been  no  season  during  all  that  time,  as  far  as  we 
know  (and  during  such  seasons  as  she  v/as  inhabited  at  all), 
that  she  has  been  without  her  little  community  of  Christians 
"faithful  unto  death."  Hers  was  the  only  church  against 
which  no  threats  were  implied  in  the  Revelation,  and  the  only 
one  which  survived. 

With  Ephesus,  forty  miles  from  here,  where  was  located 
another  of  the  seven  churches,  the  case  was  different.  The 
"candlestick"  has  been  removed  from  Ephesus.  Her  light 
has  been  put  out.  Pilgrims,  always  prone  to  find  prophecies 
in  the  Bible,  and  often  where  none  exist,  speak  cheerfulry 
and  complacently  of  poor  ruined  Ephesus  as  the  victim  of 
prophecy.  And  yet  there  is  no  sentence  that  promises,  without 
due  qualification,  the  destruction  of  the  city.  The  words  are : 

Remember,  therefore,  from  whence  thou  art  fallen,  and  repent,  and 
do  the  first  works;  or  else  I  will  come  unto  thee  quickly,  and  will 
remove  thy  candlestick  out  of  his  place,  except  thou  repent. 

That  is  all;  the  other  verses  are  singularly  complimentary 
to  Ephesus.  The  threat  is  qualified.  There  is  no  history  to. 
show  that  she  did  not  repent.  But  the  crudest  habit  the? 
modern  prophecy-savans  have  is  that  one  of  cooly  and  arbi 
trarily  fitting  the  prophetic  shirt  on  to  the  wrong  man.  They 
do  it  without  regard  to  rhyme  or  reason.  Both  the  cases 
I  have  just  mentioned  are  instances  in  point.  Those 
"prophecies"  are  distinctly  leveled  at  the  "churches  of  Ephesus, 
Smyrna,"  etc.,  and  yet  the  pilgrims  invariably  make  them  re 
fer  to  the  cities  instead.  No  crown  of  life  is  promised  to 
the  town  of  Smyrna  and  its  commerce,  but  to  the  handful  of 
Christians  who  formed  its  "church."  If  they  were  "faithful 
unto  death,"  they  have  their  crown  now — but  no  amount  of 
faithfulness  and  legal  shrewdness  combined  could  legitimately 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  287 

drag  the  city  into  a  participation  in  the  promises  of  the 
prophecy.  The  stately  language  of  the  Bible  refers  to  a  crown 
of  life  whose  luster  will  reflect  the  day-beams  of  the  endless 
ages  of  eternity,  not  the  butterfly  existence  of  a  city  built 
by  men's  hands,  which  must  pass  to  dust  with  the  builders 
and  be  forgotten  even  in  the  mere  handful  of  centuries  vouch 
safed  to  the  solid  world  itself  between  its  cradle  and  its  grave. 

The  fashion  of  delving  out  fulfilments  of  prophecy  where 
that  prophecy  consists  of  mere  "ifs,"  trenches  upon  the  absurd. 
Suppose,  a  thousand  years  from  now,  a  malarious  swamp 
builds  itself  up  in  the  shallow  harbor  of  Smyrna,  or  something 
else  kills  the  town;  and  suppose,  also,  that  within  that  time 
the  swamp  that  has  filled  the  renowned  harbor  of  Ephesus 
and  rendered  her  ancient  site  deadly  and  uninhabitable  to 
day,  becomes  hard  and  healthy  ground ;  suppose  the  natural 
consequence  ensues,  to  wit:  that  Smyrna  becomes  a  melan 
choly  ruin,  and  Ephesus  is  rebuilt.  What  would  the  prophecy- 
savans  say?  They  would  cooly  skip  over  our  age  of  the  world, 
and  say:  "Smyrna  was  not  faithful  unto  death,  and  so  her 
crown  of  life  was  denied  her ;  Ephesus  repented,  and  lo ! 
her  candlestick  was  not  removed.  Behold  these  evidences ! 
How  wonderful  is  prophecy!" 

Smyrna  has  been  utterly  destroyed  six  times.  If  her  crown 
of  life  had  been  an  insurance  policy,  she  would  have  had  an 
opportunity  to  collect  on  it  the  first  time  she  fell.  But  she 
holds  it  on  sufferance  and  by  a  complimentary  construction  of 
language  which  does  not  refer  to  her.  Six  different  times, 
however,  I  suppose  some  infatuated  prophecy-enthusiast  blun 
dered  along  and  said,  to  the  infinite  disgust  of  Smyrna  and 
the  Smyrniotes :  "In  sooth,  here  is  astounding  fulfilment  of 
prophecy!  Smyrna  hath  not  been  faithful  unto  death,  and 
behold  her  crown  of  life  is  vanished  from  her  head.  Verily, 
these  things  be  astonishing!" 

Such  things  have  a  bad  influence.  They  provoke  worldly 
men  into  using  light  conversation  concerning  sacred  subjects. 
Thick-headed  commentators  upon  the  Bible,  and  stupid 
preachers  and  teachers,  work  more  damage  to  religion  than 
sensible,  cool-brained  clergymen  can  fight  away  again,  toil 
as  they  may.  It  is  not  good  judgment  to  fit  a  crown  of  life 
upon  a  city  which  has  been  destroyed  six  times.  That  other 
class  of  wiseacres  who  twist  prophecy  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
make  it  promise  the  destruction  and  desolation  of  the  same 
city,  use  judgment  just  as  bad,  since  the  city  is  in  a  very 


288  MARK  TWAIN 

flourishing  condition  now,  unhappily  for  them.    These  things 
put  arguments  into  the  mouth  of  infidelity. 

A  portion  of  the  city  is  pretty  exclusively  Turkish;  the 
Jews  have  a  quarter  to  themselves;  the  Franks  another 
quarter;  so,  also,  with  the  Armenians.  The  Armenians,  of 
course,  are  Christians.  Their  houses  are  large,  clean,  airy, 
handsomely  paved  with  black  and  white  square,  of  marble,  and 
in  the  center  of  many  of  them  is  a  square  court,  which  has 
in  it  a  luxuriant  flower-garden  and  a  sparkling  fountain;  the 
doors  of  all  the  rooms  open  on  this.  A  very  wide  hall  leads 
to  the  street-door,  and  in  this  the  women  sit,  the  most  of 
the  day.  In  the  cool  of  the  evening  they  dress  up  in  their 
best  raiment  and  show  themselves  at  the  door.  They  are  all 
comely  of  countenance,  and  exceedingly  neat  and  cleanly;  they 
look  as  if  they  were  just  out  of  a  bandbox.  Some  of  the 
young  ladies — many  of  them,  I  may  say — are  even  very  beauti 
ful;  they  average  a  shade  better  than  American  girls — which 
treasonable  words  I  pray  may  be  forgiven  me.  They  are  very 
sociable,  and  will  smile  back  when  a  stranger  smiles  at  them, 
bow  back  when  he  bows,  and  talk  back  if  he  speaks  to  them. 
No  introduction  is  required.  An  hour's  chat  at  the  door  with 
a  pretty  girl  one  never  saw  before,  is  easily  obtained,  and  is 
very  pleasant.  I  have  tried  it.  I  could  not  talk  anything  but 
English,  and  the  girl  knew  nothing  but  Greek,  or  Armenian, 
or  some  such  barbarous  tongue,  but  we  got  along  very  well. 
I  find  that  in  cases  like  these,  the  fact  that  you  cannot  compre 
hend  each  other  isn't  much  of  a  drawback.  In  that  Russian 
town  of  Yalta  I  danced  an  astonishing  sort  of  dance  an  hour 
long,  and  one  I  had  not  heard  of  before,  with  a  very  pretty 
girl,  and  we  talked  incessantly,  and  laughed  exhaustingly,  and 
neither  one  ever  knew  what  the  other  was  driving  at.  But; 
it  was  splendid.  There  were  twenty  people  in  the  set,  and 
the  dance  was  very  lively  and  complicated.  It  was  compli 
cated  enough  without  me — with  me  it  was  more  so.  I  threw 
in  a  figure  now  and  then  that  surprised  those  Russians.  But 
I  have  never  ceased  to  think  of  that  girl.  I  have  written 
to  her,  but  I  cannot  direct  the  epistle  because  her  name  is 
one  of  those  nine-jointed  Russian  affairs,  and  there  are  not 
letters  enough  in  our  alphabet  to  hold  out.  I  am  not  reckless 
enough  to  try  to  pronounce  it  when  I  am  awake,  but  I  make 
a  stagger  ^at  it  in  my  dreams,  and  get  up  with  the  lockjaw  in 
the  morning.  I  am  fading.  I  do  not  take  my  meals  now, 
with  any  sort  of  regularity.  Her  dear  name  haunts  me  still 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  289 

in  my  dreams.  It  is  awful  on  teeth.  It  never  comes  out 
of  my  mouth  but  it  fetches  an  old  snag  along  with  it.  And 
then  the  lockjaw  closes  down  and  nips  off  a  couple  of  the 
last  syllables — but  they  taste  good. 

Coming  through  the  Dardanelles,  we  saw  camel-trains  on 
shore  with  the  glasses,  but  we  were  never  close  to  one  till  we 
got  to  Smyrna.  These  camels  are  very  much  larger  than  the 
scrawny  specimens  one  sees  in  the  menagerie.  They  stride 
along  these  streets,  in  single  file,  a  dozen  in  a  train,  with 
heavy  loads  on  their  backs,  and  a  fancy-looking  negro  in 
Turkish  costume,  or  an  Arab,  preceding  them  on  a  little 
donkey  and  completely  overshadowed  and  rendered  insig 
nificant  by  the  huge  beasts.  To  the  sea  a  camel-train  laden  with 
the  spices  of  Arabia  and  the  rare  fabrics  of  Persia  come 
marching  through  the  narrow  alleys  of  the  bazar,  among 
porters  with  their  burdens,  money-changers,  lamp-merchants, 
Almaschars  in  the  glassware  business  portly  cross-legged 
Turks  smoking  the  famous  narghili,  and  the  crowds  drifting 
to  and  fro  in  the  fanciful  costumes  of  the  East,  is  a  genuine 
revelation  of  the  Orient.  The  picture  lacks  nothing.  It 
casts  you  back  at  once  in  your  forgotten  boyhood,  and  again 
you  dream  over  the  wonders  of  the  Arabian  Nights ;  again 
your  companions  are  princes,  your  lord  is  the  Caliph  Haroun 
Al  Raschid,  and  your  servants  are  terrific  giants  and  genii  that 
come  with  smoke  and  lightning  and  thunder,  and  go  as  a 
storm  goes  when  they  depart! 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

WE   inquired   and   learned   that   the    lions    of    Smyrna 
consisted  of  the  ruins  of  the  ancient  citadel,  whose 
broken  and  prodigious  battlements  frown  upon  the 
city  from  a  lofty  hill  just  in  the  edge  of  the  town — the  Mount 
Pagus  of  Scripture,  they  call  it;  the  site  of  that  one  of  the 
seven  apocalyptic  churches  of  Asia  which  was  located  here  in 
the  first  century  of  the  Christian  era;  and  the  grave  and  the 
place  of  martyrdom  of  the  venerable  Polycarp,  who  suffered  in 
Smyrna  for  his  religion  some  eighteen  hundred  years  ago. 

We  took  little  donkeys  and  started.  We  saw  Polycarp's 
tomb,  and  then  hurried  on. 

The  "Seven  Churches"— thus  they  abbreviate  it— came 
next  on  our  list.  We  rode  there — about  a  mile  and  a  half 
in  the  sweltering  sun — and  visited  a  little  Greek  church  which 
they  said  was  built  upon  the  ancient  cite ;  and  we  paid  a  small 
fee,  and  the  holy  attendant  gave  each  of  us  a  little  wax  candle 
as  a  remembrance  of  the  place,  and  I  put  mine  in  my  hat  and 
the  sun  melted  it  and  the  grease  all  ran  down  the  back  of  my 
neck ;  and  so  now  I  have  not  anything  left  but  the  wick,  and  it 
is  a  sorry  and  wilted-looking  wick  at  that. 

Several  of  us  argued  as  well  as  we  could  that  the  "church" 
mentioned  in  the  Bible  meant  a  party  of  Christians,  and  not 
a  building;  that  the  Bible  spoke  of  them  as  being  very  poor — 
so  poor,  I  thought,  and  so  subject  to  persecution  (as  per; 
Polycarp's  martyrdom)  that  in  the  first  place  they  probably' 
could  not  have  afforded  a  church  edifice,  and  in  the  second 
would  not  have  dared  to  build  it  in  the  open  light  of  day  if 
they  could;  and  finally,  that  if  they  had  had  the  privilege  of 
building  it,  common  judgment  would  have  suggested  that  they 
build  it  somewhere  near  the  town.  But  the  elders  of  the 
ship's  family  ruled  us  down  and  scouted  our  evidences.  How 
ever,  retribution  came  to  them  afterward.  They  found  that 
they  had  been  led  astray  and  had  gone  to  the  wrong  place; 
they  discovered  that  the  accepted  site  is  in  the  city. 
^  Riding  through  the  town,  we  could  see  marks  of  the  six 
Smyrnas  that  have  existed  here  and  been  burned  up  by  fire 

290 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  291 

or  knocked  down  by  earthquakes.  The  hills  and  the  rocks 
are  rent  asunder  in  places,  excavations  expose  great  blocks 
of  building-stone  that  have  lain  buried  for  ages,  and  all 
the  mean  houses  and  walls  of  modern  Smyrna  along  the  way 
are  spotted  white  with  broken  pillars,  capitals,  and  fragments 
of  sculpture  marble  that  once  adorned  the  lordly  palaces 
that  were  the  glory  of  the  city  in  the  olden  time. 

The  ascent  of  the  hill  of  the  citadel  is  very  steep,  and  we 
proceeded  rather  slowly.  But  there  were  matters  of  interest 
about  us.  In  one  place,  five  hundred  feet  above  the  sea,  the 
perpendicular  bank  on  the  upper  side  of  the  road  was  ten  or 
fifteen  feet  high,  and  the  cut  exposed  three  veins  of  oyster- 
shells,  just  as  we  have  seen  quartz  veins  exposed  in  the  cutting 
of  a  road  in  Nevada  or  Montana.  The  veins  were  about 
eighteen  inches  thick  and  two  or  three  feet  apart,  and  they 
slanted  along  downward  for  a  distance  of  thirty  feet  or  more, 
and  then  disappeared  where  the  cut  joined  the  road.  Heaven 
only  knows  how  far  a  man  might  trace  them  by  "stripping." 
They  were  clean,  nice  oyster-shells,  large,  and  just  like  any 
other  oyster-shells.  They  were  thickly  massed  together,  and 
none  were  scattered  above  or  below  the  veins.  Each  one  was  a 
well-defined  lead  by  itself,  and  without  a  spur.  My  first  in 
stinct  was  to  set  up  the  usual — 


NOTICE 


We,  the  undersigned,  claim  five  claims  of  two  hundred  feet  each 
(and  one  for  discovery)  on  this  ledge  or  lode  of  oyster-shells,  with 
all  its  dips,  spurs,  angles,  variations,  and  sinuosities,  and  fifty  feet 
on  each  side  of  the  same,  to  work  it,  etc.,  etc.,  according  to  the  mining 
laws  of  Smyrna. 

They  were  '  such  perfectly  natural-looking  leads  that  I 
could  hardly  keep  from  "taking  them  up."  Among  the  oyster- 
shells  were  mixed  many  fragments  of  ancient,  broken  crockery- 
ware.  Now  how  did  those  masses  of  oyster-shells  get  there? 
I  cannot  determine.  Broken  crockery  and  oyster-shells  are 
suggestive  of  restaurants — but  then  they  could  have  had  no 
such  places  away  up  there  on  that  mountainside  in  our  time, 
because  nobody  has  lived  up  there.  A  restaurant  would  not 
pay  in  such  a  stony,  forbidding,  desolate  place.  And  be 
sides,  there  were  no  champagne  corks  among  the  shells.  If 
there  ever  was  a  restaurant  there,  it  must  have  been  in 
Smyrna's  palmy  days,  when  the  hills  were  covered  with 
palaces.  I  could  believe  in  one  restaurant,  on  those  terms; 


292  MARK  TWAIN 

but  then  how  about  the  three?  Did  they  have  restaurants 
there  at  three  different  periods  of  the  world? — because  there 
are  two  or  three  feet  of  solid  earth  between  the  oyster  leads. 
^Evidently,  the  restaurant  solution  will  not  answer. 

The  hill  might  have  been  the  bottom  of  the  sea,  once,  and 
been  lifted  up,  with  its  oyster-beds,  by  an  earthquake — but, 
then,  how  about  the  crockery  ?  And,  morover,  how  about  three 
oyster-beds,  one  above  another,  and  thick  strata  of  good  honest 
earth  between? 

That  theory  will  not  do.  It  is  just  possible  that  this  hill 
is  Mount  Ararat,  and  that  Noah's  Ark  rested  here,  and  he 
ate  oysters  and  threw  the  shells  overboard.  But  that  will  not 
do,  either.  There  are  the  three  layers  again  and  the  solid  earth 
between — and,  besides,  there  were  only  eight  in  Noah's  fam 
ily,  and  they  could  not  have  eaten  all  these  oysters  in  the  two 
or  three  months  they  stayed  on  top  of  that  mountain.  The 
beasts — however,  it  is  simply  absurd  to  suppose  he  did  not 
know  any  more  than  to  feed  the  beasts  on  oyster  suppers. 

It  is  painful — it  is  even  humiliating — but  I  am  reduced  at 
last  to  one  slender  theory:  that  the  oysters  climbed  up  there 
of  their  own  accord.  But  what  object  could  they  have  had  in 
view? — what  did  they  want  up  there?  What  could  any  oyster 
want  to  climb  a  hill  for?  To  climb  a  hill  must  necessarily 
be  fatiguing  and  annoying  exercise  for  an  oyster.  The  most 
natural  conclusion  would  be  that  the  oysters  climbed  up  there 
to  look  at  the  scenery.  Yet  when  one  comes  to  reflect  upon 
the  nature  of  an  oyster,  it  seems  plain  that  he  does  not  care 
for  scenery.  An  oyster  has  no  taste  for  such  things ;  he  cares 
nothing  for  the  beautiful.  An  oyster  is  of  a  retiring  disposi 
tion,  and  not  lively — not  even  cheerful  above  the  average,  and 
never  enterprising.  But,  above  all,  an  oyster  does  not  take  | 
any  interest  in  scenery — he  scorns  it.  What  have  I  arrived  at 
now  ?  Simply  at  the  point  I  started  from,  namely,  those  oyster- 
shells  are  there,  in  regular  layers,  five  hundred  feet  above  the 
sea,  and  no  man  knows  how  they  got  there.  I -have  hunted  up 
the  guide-books,  and  the  gist  of  what  they  say  is  this :  "They 
are  there,  but  how  they  got  there  is  a  mystery." 

Twenty-five  years  ago,  a  multitude  of  people  in  America 
put  on  their  ascension  robes,  took  a  tearful  leave  of  their 
friends,  and  made  ready  to  fly  up  into  heaven  at  the  first  blast 
of  the  trumpet.  But  the  angel  did  not  blow  it.  Miller's 
resurrection  day  was  a  failure.  The  Millerites  were  disgusted. 
I  did  not  suspect  that  there  were  Millers  in  Asia  Minor,  but  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  293 

gentleman  tells  me  that  they  had  it  all  set  for  the  world  to 
come  to  an  end  in  Smyrna  one  day  about  three  years  ago. 
There  was  much  buzzing  and  preparation  for  a  long  time  pre 
viously,  and  it  culminated  in  a  wild  excitement  at  the  ap 
pointed  time.  A  vast  number  of  the  populace  ascended  the 
citadel  hill  early  in  the  morning,  to  get  out  of  the  way  of  the 
general  destruction,  and  many  of  the  infatuated  closed  up  their 
shops  and  retired  from  all  earthly  business.  But  the  strange 
part  of  it  was  that  about  three  in  the  afternoon,  while  this 
gentleman  and  his  friends  were  at  dinner  in  the  hotel,  a  terrific 
storm  of  rain,  accompanied  by  thunder  and  lightning,  broke 
forth  and  continued  with  dire  fury  for  two  or  three  hours. 
It  was  a  thing  unprecedented  in  Smyrna  at  that  time  of  the 
year,  and  scared  some  of  the  most  skeptical.  The  streets  ran 
rivers  and  the  hotel  floor  was  flooded  with  water.  The  dinner 
had  to  be  suspended.  When  the  storm  finished  and  left 
.everybody  drenched  through  and  through,  and  melancholy  and 
half-drowned,  the  ascensionists  came  down  from  the  mountain 
as  dry  as  so  many  charity-sermons!  They  had  been  looking 
down  upon  the  fearful  storm  going  on  below,  and  really  be 
lieved  that  their  proposed  destruction  of  the  world  was  prov- 
inera  grand  success. 

QT railway  here  in  Asia — in  the  dreamy  realm  of  the  Orient^ 
— in   the   fabled   land   of   the  Arabian   Nights — is   a   strange  • 
thing  to  think  of.     And  yet  they  have  one  already,  and  are  ' 
building  another.     The   present   one   is   well   built   and   well 
conducted,  by  an  English  company,  but  is  not  long  doing  an  im 
mense  amount  of  business.     The  first  year  it  carried  a  good 
many  passengers,  but  its  freight  list  only  comprised  eight  hun 
dred  pounds  of  figs! 

It  runs  almost,  to  the  very  gates  of  Ephesus — a  town 
great  in  all  ages  of  the  world — a  city  familiar  to  readers 
of  the  Bible,  and  one  which  was  as  old  as  the  very  hills  when 
the  disciples  of  Christ  preached  in  its  streets.  It  dates  back 
to  the  shadowy  ages  of  tradition,  and  was  the  birthplace  of 
gods  renowned  in  Grecian  mythology.  The  idea  of  a  loco 
motive  tearing  through  such  a  place  as  this,  and  waking  the 
phantoms  of  its  old  days  of  romance  out  of  their  dreams  of 
dead  and  gone  centuries,  is  curious  enougHp 

We  journey  thither  to-morrow  to  see  the  celebrated  ruins. 


CHAPTER  XL 

THIS  has  been  a  stirring  day.     The  superintendent  of 
the  railway  put  a  train  at  our  disposal,  and  did  us  the 
further  kindness  of  accompanying  us  to  Ephesus  and 
giving  to  us  his  watchful  care.     We  brought  sixty  scarcely 
perceptible   donkeys   in   the   freight-cars,    for    we   had    much 
ground  to  go  over.    We  have  seen  some  of  the  most  grotesque 
costumes,  along  the  line  of  the  railroad,  that  can  be  imagined. 
I  am  glad  that  no  possible  combination  of  words  could  describe 
them,  for  I  might  then  be  foolish  enough  to  attempt  it. 

At  ancient  Ayassalook,  in  the  midst  of  a  forbidding 
desert,  we  came  upon  long  lines  of  ruined  aqueducts,  and  other 
remnants  of  architectural  grandeur,  that  told  us  plainly  enough 
we  were  nearing  what  had  been  a  metropolis  once.  We  left 
the  train  and  mounted  the  donkeys,  along  with  our  invited 
guests — pleasant  young  gentlemen  from  the  officers'  list  of  an 
American  man-of-war. 

The  little  donkeys  had  saddles  upon  them  which  were  made 
very  high  in  order  that  the  rider's  feet  might  not  drag  the 
ground.  The  preventative  did  not  work  well  in  the  cases  of 
our  tallest  pilgrims,  however.  These  were  no  bridles — nothing 
but  a  single  rope,  tied  to  the  bit.  It  was  purely  ornamental, 
for  the  donkey  cared  nothing  for  it.  If  he  were  drifting 
to  starboard,  you  might  put  your  helm  down  hard  the  other 
way,  if  it  were  any  satisfaction  to  you  to  do  it,  but  he 
would  continue  to  drift  to  starboard  all  the  same.  There  was 
only  one  process  which  could  be  depended  on,  and  that  was  I 
to  get  down  and  lift  his  rear  around  until  his  head  pointed 
in  the  right  direction,  or  take  him  under  your  arm  and  carry 
him  to  a  part  of  the  road  which  he  could  not  get  out  of 
without  climbing.  The  sun  flamed  down  as  hot  as  a  furnace, 
and  neck-scarfs,  veils,  and  umbrellas  seemed  hardly  any  pro 
tection;  they  served  only  to  make  the  long  procession  look 
more  than  ever  fantastic — for  be  it  known  the  ladies  were 
all  riding  astride  because  they  could  not  stay  on  the  shapeless 
saddles  sidewise,  the  men  were  perspiring  and  out  of  temper, 
their  feet  were  banging  against  the  rocks,  the  donkeys  were 

294 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  295 

capering  in  every  direction  but  the  right  one  and  being  be 
labored  with  clubs  for  it,  and  every  now  and  then  a  broad 
umbrella  would  suddenly  go  down  out  of  the  cavalcade,  an 
nouncing  to  all  that  one  more  pilgrim  had  bitten  the  dust. 
It  was  a  wilder  picture  than  those  solitudes  had  seen  for  many 
z.  day.  No  donkeys  ever  existed  that  were  as  hard  to  navigate 
as  these,  I  think,  or  that  had  so  many  vile,  exasperating 
instincts.  Occasionally,  we  grew  so  tired  and  breathless 
with  righting  them  that  we  had  to  desist — and  immediately 
the  donkey  would  come  down  to  a  deliberate  walk.  This,  with 
the  fatigue,  and  the  sun,  would  put  a  man  asleep ;  and  as  soon 
as  the  man  was  asleep,  the  donkey  would  lie  down.  My  donkey 
shall  never  see  his  boyhood's  home  again.  He  has  lain  down 
once  too  often.  He  must  die. 

We  all  stood  in  the  vast  theater  of  ancient  Ephesus — the 
stone-benched  amphitheater,  I  mean — and  had  our  picture 
taken.  We  looked  as  proper  there  as  we  would  look  any 
where,  I  suppose.  We  do  not  embellish  the  general  des 
olation  of  a  desert  much.  We  add  what  dignity  we  can  to  a 
stately  ruin  with  our  green  umbrellas  and  jackasses,  but  it 
is  little.  However,  we  mean  well. 

I  wish  to  say  a  brief  word  of  the  aspect  of  Ephesus. 

On  a  high,  steep  hill,  toward  the  sea,  is  a  gray  ruin  of  pon 
derous  blocks  of  marble,  wherein,  tradition  says,  St.  Paul 
was  imprisoned  eighteen  centuries  ago.  From  these  old  walls 
you  have  the  finest  view  of  the  desolate  scene  where  once  stood 
Ephesus,  the  proudest  city  of  ancient  times,  and  whose  Temple 
of  Diana  was  so  noble  in  design  and  so  exquisite  of  work 
manship,  that  it  ranked  high  in  the  list  of  the  Seven  Wonders 
of  the  World. 

Behind  you  is  the  sea;  in  front  is  a  level  green  valley  (a 
marsh,  in  fact),  extending  far  away  among  the  mountains; 
to  the  right  of  the  front  view  is  the  old  citadel  of  Ayassalook, 
on  a  high  hill;  the  ruined  mosque  of  the  Sultan  Selim  stands 
near  it  in  the  plain  (this  is  built  over  the  grave  of  St.  John, 
and  was  formerly  a  Christian  church)  ;   further  toward  you 
is  the  hill  of  Prion,  around  whose  front  is  clustered  all  that 
remains  of  the  ruins  of  Ephesus  that  still  stand ;  divided  from 
it  by  a  narrgw  valley  is  the  long,  rocky,  rugged  mountain  of 
Coressus.    f£he  scene  is  a  pretty  one,  and  yet  desolate — for  I 
in  that  wide  plain  no  man  can  live,  and  in  it  is  no  human  j 
habitation.    But  for  the  crumbling  arches  and  monstrous^  piers  1 
and    broken   walls   that   rise   from  the    foot   of   the  hill   of  I 


296  MARK  TWAiN 

Prion,  one  could  not  believe  that  in  this  place  once  stood 
a  city  whose  renown  is  older  than  tradition  itself.  It  is  in 
credible  to  reflect  that  things  as  familiar  all  over  the  world 
to-day  as  household  words  belong  in  the  history  and  in  the 
shadowy  legends  of  this  silent,  mournful  solitud^  We  speak 
of  Apollo  and  of  Diana — they  were  born  here;  of  the  meta 
morphosis  of  Syrinx  into  a  reed — it  was  done  here;  of  the 
great  god  Pan — he  dwelt  in  the  caves  of  this  hill  of  Coressus ; 
of  the  Amazons — this  was  their  best-prized  home ;  of  Bacchus 
and  Hercules — both  fought  the  warlike  women  here;  of  the 
Cyclops — they  laid  the  ponderous  marble  blocks  of  some  of 
the  ruins  yonder;  of  Homer — this  was  one  of  his  many  birth 
places;  of  Cimon  of  Athens;  of  Alcibiades,  Lysander,  Agesi- 
laus — they  visited  here;  so  did  Alexander  the  Great;  so  did 
Hannibal  and  Antiochus,  Scipio,  Lucullus,  and  Sylla;  Brutus, 
Cassius,  Pompey,  Cicero,  and  Augustus;  Antony  was  a  judge 
in  this  place,  and  left  his  seat  in  the  open  court,  while  the 
advocates  were  speaking,  to  run  after  Cleopatra,  who  passed 
the  door;  from  this  city  these  two  sailed  on  pleasure  ex 
cursions,  in  galleys  with  silver  oars  and  perfumed  sails,  and 
with  companies  of  beautiful  girls  to  serve  them,  and  actors 
and  musicians  to  amuse  them ;  in  days  that  seem  almost 
modern,  so  remote  are  they  from  the  early  history  of  this  city, 
Paul  the  Apostle  preached  the  new  religion  here,  and  so  did 
John,  and  here  it  is  supposed  the  former  was  pitted  against 
wild  beasts,  for  in  I  Corinthians,  xv :  32,  he  says : 

If  after  the  manner  of  men  I  have  fought  with  beasts  at  Ephesus 
[etc.] 

when  many  men  still  lived  who  had  seen  the  Christ;  here 
Mary  Magdalen  died,  and  here  the  Virgin  Mary  ended  her 
days  with  John,  albeit  Rome  has  since  judged  it  best  to  locate 
her  grave  elsewhere;  six  or  seven  hundred  years  ago — almost 
yesterday,  as  it  were — troops  of  mail-clad  Crusaders  thronged 
the^  streets;  and  to  come  down  to  trifles,  we  speak  of  mean 
dering  streams,  and  find  a  new  interest  in  a  common  word 
when  we  discover  that  the  crookepL  river  Meander,  in  yonder 
/valley,  gave  it  to  our  dictionary.  It  makes  me, feel  as  old  as 
|  these  dreary  hills  to  look  down  upon  these  moss-hung  ruins, 
s  this  historic  desolation:  One  may  read  the  Scriptures  and 
believe,  but  ^  cannot  'go  and  stand  yonder  in  the  ruined 
theater  and  in  imagination  people  it  again  with  the  vanished 
multitudes  who  mobbed  Paul's  comrades  there  and  shouted, 
with  one  voice,  "Great  is  Diana  of  the  Ephesians !"  The  idea 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  297 

of  a  shout  in  such  a  solitude  as  this  almost  makes  one  shudder. 

It  was  a  wonderful  city,  this  Ephesus.  Go  where  you  will 
about  these  broad  plains,  you  find  the  most  exquisitely  sculp 
tured  marble  fragments  scattered  thick  among  the  dust  and 
weeds ;  and  protruding  from  the  ground,  or  lying  prone  upon 
it,  are  beautiful  fluted  columns  of  porphyry  and  all  precious 
marbles;  and  at  every  step  you  find  elegantly  carved  capitals 
and  massive  bases,  and  polished  tablets  engraved  with  Greek 
inscriptions.  It  is  a  world  of  precious  relics,  a  wilderness 
of  marred  and  mutilated  gems.  And  yet  what  are  these  things 
to  the  wonders  that  lie  buried  here  under  the  ground  ?  At  Con 
stantinople,  at  Pisa,  in  the  cities  of  Spain,  are  great  mosques, 
and  cathedrals,  whose  grandest  columns  came  from  the  temples 
and  palaces  of  Ephesus,  and  yet  one  has  only  to  scratch  the 
ground  here  to  match  them.  We  shall  never  know  what  mag 
nificence  is,  until  this  imperial  city  is  laid  bare  to  the  sun. 

The  finest  piece  of  sculpture  we  have  yet  seen  and  the 
one  that  impressed  us  most  (for  we  do  not  know  much  about 
art  and  cannot  easily  work  up  ourselves  into  ecstasies  over 
it),  is  one  that  lies  in  this  old  theater  of  Ephesus  which  St. 
Paul's  riot  has  made  so  celebrated.  It  is  only  the  headless 
body  of  a  man,  clad  in  a  coat  of  mail,  with  a  Medusa  head 
upon  the  breastplate,  but  we  feel  persuaded  that  such  dignity 
and  such  majesty  were  never  thrown  into  a  form  of  stone 
before. 

What  builders  they  were,  these  men  of  antiquity !  The  mas 
sive  arches  of  some  of  these  ruins  rest  upon  piers  that  are 
fifteen  feet  square  and  built  entirely  of  solid  blocks  of  marble, 
some  of  which  are  as  large  as  a  Saratoga  trunk,  and  some  the 
size  of  a  boarding-house  sofa.  They  are  not  shells  or  shafts 
of  stone  filled  inside  with  rubbish,  but  the  whole  pier  is  a 
mass  of  solid  masonry.  Vast  arches,  that  may  have  been  the 
gates  of  the  city,  are  built  in  the  same  way.  They  have 
braved  the  storms  and  sieges  of  three  thousand  years,  and 
have  been  shaken  by  many  an  earthquake,  but  still  they  stand. 
When  they  dig  alongside  of  them,  they  find  ranges  of  pon 
derous  masonry  that  are  as  perfect  in  every  detail  as  they 
were  the  day  those  old  Cyclopean  giants  finished  them.  An 
English  company  is  going  to  excavate  Ephesus — and  then! 

And  now  am  I  reminded  of — 


298  MARK  TWAIN 

THE    LEGEND    OF    THE    SEVEN    SLEEPERS 

In  the  Mount  of  Prion,  yonder,  is  the  Cave  of  the  Seven 
Sleepers.  Once  upon  a  time,  about  fifteen  hundred  years 
ago,  seven  young  men  lived  near  each  other  in  Ephesus,  who 
belonged  to  the  despised  sect  of  the  Christians.  It  came  to 
pass  that  the  good  King  Maximilianus  (I  am  telling  this 
story  for  nice  little  boys  and  girls),  it  came  to  pass,  I  say, 
that  the  good  King  Maximilianus  fell  to  persecuting  the 
Christians,  and  as  time  rolled  on  he  made  it  very  warm  for 
them.  So  the  seven  young  men  said  one  to  the  other,  Let 
us  get  up  and  travel.  And  they  got  up  and  traveled.  They 
tarried  not  to  bid  their  fathers  and  mothers  good-by,  or  any 
friend  they  knew.  They  only  took  certain  moneys  which 
their  parents  had,  and  garments  that  belonged  unto  their 
friends,  whereby  they  might  remember  them  when  far  away; 
and  they  took  also  the  dog  Kermehr,  which  was  the  property 
of  their  neighbor  Malchus,  because  the  beast  did  run  his 
head  into  a  noose  which  one  of  the  young  men  was  carrying 
carelessly,  and  they  had  not  time  to  release  him;  and  they 
took  also  certain  chickens  that  seemed  lonely  in  the  neighbor 
ing  coops,  and  likewise  some  bottles  of  curious  liquors  that 
stood  near  the  grocer's  window ;  and  then  they  departed  from 
the  city.  By  and  by  they  came  to  a  marvelous  cave  in  the 
Hill  of  Prion  and  entered  into  it  and  feasted,  and  presently 
they  hurried  on  again.  But  they  forgot  the  bottles  of  curious 
liquors,  and  left  them  behind.  They  traveled  in  many  lands, 
and  had  many  strange  adventures.  They  were  virtuous  young 
men,  and  lost  no  opportunity  that  fell  in  their  way  to  "make 
their  livelihood.  Their  motto  was  in  these  words,  namely, 
"Procrastination  is  the  thief  of  time."  And  so,  whenever  they 
did  come  upon  a  man  who  was  alone,  they  said,  Behold,  this 
person  hath  the  wherewithal — let  us  go  through  him.  And  they 
went  through  him.  At  the  end  of  five  years  they  had  waxed 
tired  of  travel  and  adventure,  and  longed  to  revisit  their  old 
home  again  and  hear  the  voices  and  see  the  faces  that  were 
dear  unto  their  youth.  Therefore  they  went  through  such 
parties  as  fell  in  their  way  where  they  sojourned  at  that 
time,  and  journeyed  back  toward  Ephesus  again.  For  the 

food  King  Maximilianus  was  become  converted  unto  the  new 
aith,  and  the  Christians  rejoiced  because  they  were  no  longer 
persecuted.     One  day  as  the  sun  went  down,  they  came  to 
the  cave  in  the  Mount  of  Prion,  and  they  said,  each  to  his 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  299 

fellow,  Let  us  sleep  here,  and  go  and  feast  and  make  merry 
with  our  friends  when  the  morning  cometh.  And  each  of  the 
seven  lifted  up  his  voice  and  said,  It  is  a  whiz.  So  they 
went  in,  and  lo,  where  they  had  put  them,  there  lay  the 
bottles  of  strange  liquors,  and  they  judged  that  age  had  not 
impaired  their  excellence.  Wherein  the  wanderers  were  right, 
and  the  heads  of  the  same  were  level.  So  each  of  the  young 
men  drank  six  bottles,  and  behold  they  felt  very  tired,  then, 
and  lay  down  and  slept  soundly. 

When  they  awoke,  one  of  them,  Johannes — surnamed 
Smithianus — said,  We  are  naked.  And  it  was  so.  Their 
raiment  was  all  gone,  and  the  money  which  they  had  gotten 
from  a  stranger  whom  they  had  proceeded  through  as  they 
approached  the  city,  was  lying  upon  the  ground,  corroded 
and  rusted  and  defaced.  Likewise  the  dog  Ketmehr  was  gone, 
and  nothing  save  the  brass  that  was  upon  his  collar  remained. 
'They  wondered  much  at  these  things.  But  they  took  the 
money,  and  they  wrapped  about  their  bodies  some  leaves,  and 
came  up  to  the  top  of  the  hill.  Then  were  they  perplexed. 
The  wonderful  temple  of  Diana  was  gone;  many  grand  edi 
fices  they  had  never  seen  before  stood  in  the  city;  men  in 
strange  garbs  moved  about  the  streets,  and  every  thing  was 
changed. 

Johannes  said,  It  hardly  seems  like  Ephesus.  Yet  here 
is  the  great  gymnasium;  here  is  the  mighty  theater,  wherein 
I  have  seen  seventy  thousand  men  assembled;  here  is  the 
Agora;  there  is  the' font  where  the  sainted  John  the  Baptist 
immersed  the  converts;  yonder  is  the  prison  of  the  good  St. 
Paul,  where  we  all  did  use  to  go  to  touch  the  ancient  chains 
that  bound  him  and  be  cured  of  our  distempers ;  I  see  the 
tomb  of  the  disciple  Luke,  and  afar  off  is  the  church  wherein 
repose  the  ashes  of  the  holy  John,  where  the  Christians  of 
Ephesus  go  twice  a  year  to  gather  the  dust  from  the  tomb, 
which  is  able  to  make  bodies  whole  again  that  are  corrupted 
by  disease,  and  cleanse  the  soul  from  sin;  but  see  how  the 
wharves  encroach  upon  the  sea,  and  what  multitudes  of  ships 
are  anchored  in  the  bay ;  see,  also,  how  the  city  hath  stretched 
abroad,  far  over  the  valley  behind  Prion,  and  even  unto  the 
walls  of  Ayassalook;  and  lo,  all  the  hills  are  white  with 
palaces  and  ribbed  with  colonnades  of  marble.  How  mighty 
is  Ephesus  become! 

And  wondering  at  what  their  eyes  had  seen,  they  went 
down  into  the  city  and  purchased  garments  and  clothed  them- 


300  MARK  TWAIN 

selves.  And  when  they  would  have  passed  on,  the  merchant 
bit  the  coins  which  they  had  given  him,  with  his  teeth,  and 
turned  them  about  and  looked  curiously  upon  them,  and  cast 
them  upon  his  counter,  and  listened  if  they  rang;  and  then 
he  said,  These  be  bogus.  And  they  said,  Depart  thou  to 
Hades,  and  went  their  way.  When  they  were  come  to  their 
houses,  they  recognized  them,  albeit  they  seemed  old  and 
mean;  and  they  rejoiced,  and  were  glad.  They  ran  to  the 
doors,  and  knocked,  and  strangers  opened,  and  looked  inquir 
ingly  upon  them.  And  they  said,  with  great  excitement,  while 
their  hearts  beat  high,  and  the  color  in  their  faces  came  and 
went,  Where  is  my  father?  Where  is  my  mother?  Where 
are  Dionysius  and  Serapion,  and  Pericles,  and  Decius?  And 
the  strangers  that  opened  said,  We  know  not  these.  The 
Seven  said,  How,  you  know  them  not?  How  long  have  ye 
dwelt  here,  and  whither  are  they  gone  that  dwelt  here  be 
fore  ye?  And  the  strangers  said,  Ye  play  upon  us  with 
a  jest,  young  men;  we  and  our  fathers  have  sojourned  under 
these  roofs  these  six  generations ;  the  names  ye  utter  rot  upon 
the  tombs,  and  they  that  bore  them  have  run  their  brief  race, 
have  laughed  and  sung,  have  borne  the  sorrows  and  the  weari 
ness  that  were  allotted  them,  and  are  at  rest;  for  ninescore 
years  the  summers  have  come  and  gone,  and  the  autumn  leaves 
have  fallen,  since  the  roses  faded  out  of  their  cheeks  and  they 
laid  them  to  sleep  with  the  dead. 

Then  the  seven  young  men  turned  them  away  from  their 
homes,  and  the  strangers  shut  the  doors  upon  them.  The 
wanderers  marveled  greatly,  and  looked  into  the  faces  of  all 
they  met,  as  hoping  to  find  one  that  they  knew;  but  all  were 
strange,  and  passed  them  by  and  spake  no  friendly  word. 
They  were  sore  distressed  and  sad.  Presently  they  spake  unto 
a  citizen  and  said,  Who  is  King  in  Ephesus?  And  the  citi 
zen  answered  and  said,  Whence  come  ye  that  ye  know  not 
that  the  great  Laertius  reigns  in  Ephesus?  They  looked  one 
at  the  other,  greatly  perplexed,  and  presently  asked  again, 
Where,  then,  is  the  good  King  Maximilianus  ?  The  citizen 
moved  him  apart,  as  one  who  is  afraid,  and  said,  Verily  these 
men  be  mad,  and  dream  dreams,  else  would  they  know  that 
the  King  whereof  they  speak  is  dead  above  two  hundred 
years  agone. 

Then  the  scales  fell  from  the  eyes  of  the  Seven,  and  one 
said,  Alas,  that  we  drank  of  the  curious  liquors.  They  have 
made  us  weary,  and  in  dreamless  sleep  these  two  long  cen- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  301 

turies  have  we  lain.  Our  homes  are  desolate,  our  friends  are 
dead.  Behold,  the  jig  is  up — let  us  die.  And  that  same  day 
went  they  forth  and  laid  them  down  and  died.  And  in  that 
selfsame  day,  likewise,  the  Seven-up  did  cease  in  Ephesus, 
for  that  the  Seven  that  were  up  were  down  again,  and  de 
parted  and  dead  withal.  And  the  names  that  be  upon 
their  tombs,  even  unto  this  time,  are  Johannes  Smithianus, 
Trumps,  Gift,  High,  and  Low,  Jack,  and  The  Game.  And 
with  the  sleepers  lie  also  the  bottles  wherein  were  once  the 
curious  liquors ;  and  upon  them  is  writ,  in  ancient  letters,  such 
words  as  these — names  of  heathen  gods  of  olden  time,  per 
chance  :  Rumpunch,  Jinsling,  Eggnog. 

Such  is  the  story  of  the  Seven  Sleepers  (with  slight  varia 
tions),  and  I  know  it  is  true,  because  I  have  seen  the  cave  my 
self. 

(Really,  so  firm  a  faith  had  the  ancients  in  this  legend, 
that  as  late  as  eight  or  nine  hundred  years  ago,  learned 
travelers  held  it  in  superstitious  fear. 

Two  of  them  record  that  they  ventured  into  it,  but  ran 
quickly  out  again,  not  daring  to  tarry  lest  they  should  fall 
asleep  and  outlive  their  great-grandchildren  a  century  or  so. 
Even  at  this  day  the  ignorant  denizens  of  the  neighboring 
country  prefer  not  to  sleep  in  i£>> 


CHAPTER  XLI 

WHEN  I  last  made  a  memorandum,  we  were  at  Ephesus, 
We  are  in  Syria,  now,  encamped  in  the  mountains  of 
Lebanon.  The  interregnum  has  been  long,  both  as  to 
time  and  distance.  We  brought  not  a  relic  from  Ephesus! 
After  gathering  up  fragments  of  sculptured  marbles  and  break 
ing  ornaments  from  the  interior  work  of  the  mosques ;  and 
five  mile  on  muleback  to  the  railway  depot,  a  government 
after  bringing  them,  at  a  cost  of  infinite  trouble  and  fatigue, 
officer  compelled  all  who  had  such  things  to  disgorge !  He  had 
an  order  from  Constantinople  to  look  out  for  our  party,  and 
see  that  we  carried  nothing  off.  It  was  a  wise,  a  just,  and  a 
well-deserved  rebuke,  but  it  created  a  sensation.  I  never 
resist  a  temptation  to  plunder  a  stranger's  premises  without 
feeling  insufferably  vain  about  it.  This  time  I  felt  proud 
beyond  expression.  I  was  serene  in  the  midst  of  the  scold 
ings  that  were  heaped  upon  the  Ottoman  government  for  its 
affront  offered  to  a  pleasuring  party  of  entirely  respectable 
gentlemen  and  ladies.  I  said,  "We  that  have  free  souls,  it 
touches  us  not."  The  shoe  not  only  pinched  our  party,  but  it 
pinched  hard;  a  principal  sufferer  discovered  that  the  imperial 
order  was  inclosed  in  an  envelope  bearing  the  seal  of  the 
British  Embassy  at  Constantinople,  and  therefore  must  have 
been  inspired  by  the  representative  of  the  Queen.  This  was 
bad — very  bad.  Coming  solely  from  the  Ottomans,  it  might- 
have^  signified  only  Ottoman  hatred  of  Christians,  and  a  vul 
gar  ^  ignorance  as  to  genteel  methods  of  expressing  it;  but 
coming  from  the  Christianized,  educated,  politic  British  lega 
tion,  it  simply  intimated  that  we  were  a  sort  of  gentlemen  and 
ladies  who  would  bear  watching!  So  the  party  regarded  it, 
and  were  incensed  ^ accordingly.  The  truth  doubtless  was,  that 
the  same  precautions  would  have  been  taken  against  any 
travelers,  because  the  English  Company  who  have  acquired 
the  right  to  excavate  Ephesus,  and  have  paid  a  great  sum 
for  that  right,  need  to  be  protected,  and  deserve  to  be.  They 
cannot  afford  to  run  the  risk  of  having  their  hospitality  abused 

302 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  303 

by    travelers,    especially    since    travelers    are    sucK   notorious 
scorners  of  honest  behavior. 

We  sailed  from  Smyrna,  in  the  wildest  spirit  of  expec 
tancy,  for  the  chief  feature  /the  grand  goal  of  the  expedition, } } 
was  near  at  hand — we  were  approaching  the  Holy  LandT>  Such ' 
a  burrowing  into  the  hold  for  trunks  that  had  lain  buried 
for  weeks,  yes,  for  months ;  such  a  hurrying  to  and  fro  above 
decks  and  below;  such  a  riotous  system  of  packing  and  un 
packing;  such  a  littering  up  of  the  cabins  with  shirts  and 
skirts,  and  indescribable  and  unclassable  odds  and  ends ;  such 
a  making  up  of  bundles,  and  setting  apart  of  umbrellas,  green 
spectacles,  and  thick  veils;  such  a  critical  inspection  of  saddles 
and  bridles  that  had  never  yet  touched  horses ;  such  a  cleaning 
and  loading  of  revolvers  and  examining  of  bowie-knives ;  such 
a  half -soling  of  the  seats  of  pantaloons  with  serviceable  buck 
skin  ;  then  such  a  poring  over  ancient  maps ;  such  a  reading  up 
of  Bibles,  and  Palestine  travels ;  such  a  marking  out  of  routes ; 
such  exasperating  efforts  to  divide  up  the  company  into  little 
bands  of  congenial  spirits  who  might  make  the  long  and 
arduous  journey  without  quarreling;  and  morning,  noon,  and 
night,  such  mass-meetings  in  the  cabins,  such  speech-making, 
such  sage  suggesting,  such  worrying  and  quarreling,  and  such 
a  general  raising  of  the  very  mischief,  was  never  seen  in  the 
ship  before! 

But  it  is  all  over  now.  We  are  cut  up  into  parties  of  six 
or  eight,  and  by  this  time  are  scattered  far  and  wide.  Ours  is 
the  only  one,  however,  that  is  venturing  on  what  is  called 
"the  long  trip" — that  is,  out  into  Syria,  by  Baalbec  to  Da 
mascus,  and  thence  down  through  the  full  length  of  Palestine. 
It  would  be  a  tedious,  and  also  a  too  risky  journey,  at  this 
hot  season  of  the  year,  for  any  but  strong,  healthy  men,  accus 
tomed  somewhat  to  fatigue  and  rough  life  in  the  open  air. 
The  other  parties  will  take  shorter  journeys. 

For  the  last  two  months  we  have  been  in  a  worry  about 
one  portion  of  this  Holy  Land  pilgrimage.  I  refer  to  trans 
portation  service.  We  knew  very  well  that  Palestine  was  a 
country  which  did  not  do  a  large  passenger  business,  and  every 
man  we  came  across  who  knew  anything  about  it  gave  us  to 
understand  that  not  half  of  our  party  would  be  able  to  get 
dragomans  and  animals.  At  Constantinople  everybody  fell  to 
telegraphing  the  American  consuls  at  Alexandria  and  Beirout 
to  give  notice  that  we  wanted  dragomans  and  transportation. 
We  were  desperate — would  take  horses,  jackasses,  camel- 


304  MARK  TWAIN 

opards,  kangaroos— anything.  At  Smyrna,  more  telegraph 
ing  was  done,  to  the  same  end.  Also,  fearing  for  the  worst, 
we  telegraphed  for  a  large  number  of  seats  in  the  diligence 
for  Damascus,  and  horses  for  the  ruins  of  Baalbec. 

As  might  have  been  expected,  a  notion  got  abroad  in 
Syria  and  Egypt  that  the  whole  population  of  the  Province 
of  America  (the  Turks  consider  us  a  trifling  little,  province 
in  some  unvisited  corner  of  the  world)  were  coming  to  the 
Holy  Land — and  so,  when  we  got  to  Beirout  yesterday,  we 
found  the  place  full  of  dragomans  and  their  outfits.  We  had 
all  intended  to  go  by  diligence  to  Damascus,  and  switch  off. 
to  Baalbec  as  we  went  along — because  we  expected  to  rejoin 
the  ship,  go  to  Mount  Carmel,  and  take  to  the  woods  from 
there.  However,  when  our  own  private  party  of  eight  found 
that  it  was  possible,  and  proper  enough,  to  make  the  "long 
trip,"  we  adopted  that  program.  We  have  never  been  much 
trouble  to  a  consul  before,  but  we  have  been  a  fearful  nuisance 
to  our  consul  at  Beirout.  I  mention  this  because  I  cannot 
help  admiring  his  patience,  his  industry,  and  his  accommodat 
ing  spirit.  I  mention  it,  also,  because  I  think  some  of  our 
ship's  company  did  not  give  him  as  full  credit  for  his  excellent 
services  as  he  deserved. 

Well,  out  of  our  eight,  three  were  elected  to  attend  to  all 
business  connected  with  the  expedition.  The  rest  of  us  had 
nothing  to  do  but  look  at  the  beautiful  city  of  Beirout,  with 
its  bright,  new  houses  nestled  among  a  wilderness  of  green 
shrubbery  spread  over  an  upland  that  sloped  gently  down  to 
the  sea;  and  also  at  the  mountains  of  Lebanon  that  environ 
it;  and  likewise  to  bathe  in  the  transparent  blue  water  that 
rolled  its  billows  about  the  ship  (we  did  not  know  there  were 
sharks  there).  We  had  also  to  range  up  and  down  through 
the  town  and  look  at  the  costumes.  These  are  picturesque 
and  fanciful;  but  not  so  varied  as  at  Constantinople  and 
Smyrna;  the  women  of  Beirout  add  an  agony — in  the  two 
former  cities  the  sex  wear  a  thin  veil  which  one  can  see 
through  (and  they  often  expose  their  ankles),  but  at  Beirout 
they  cover  their  entire  faces  with  dark-colored  or  black  veils, 
so  that  they  look  like  mummies,  and  then  expose  their  breasts 
to  the  public.  A  young  gentleman  (I  believe  he  was  a 
Greek)  volunteered  to  show  us  around  the  city,  and  said  it 
would  afford  him  great  pleasure,  because  he  was  studying 
English  and  wanted  practice  in  that  language.  When  we  had 
finished  the  rounds,  however,  he  called  for  remuneration — said 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  3U5 

he  hoped  the  gentlemen  would  give  him  a  trifle  in  the  way 
of  a  few  piasters  (equivalent  to  a  few  five-cent  pieces).  We 
did  so.  The  consul  was  surprised  when  he  heard  it,  and 
said  he  knew  the  young  fellow's  family  very  well,  and  that 
they  were  an  old  and  highly  respectable  family  and  worth  a 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars !  Some  people,  so  situated, 
would  have  been  ashamed  of  the  berth  he  had  with  us  and 
his  manner  of  crawling  into  it. 

At  the  appointed  time  our  business  committee  reported, 
and  said  all  things  were  in  readiness — that  we  were  to  start 
to-day,  with  horses,  pack-animals,  and  tents,  and  go  to  Baal- 
bee,  Damascus,  the  Sea  of  Tfberias,  and  thence  southward  by 
the  way  of  the  scene  of  Jacob's  Dream  and  other  notable 
Bible  localities  to  Jerusalem — from  thence  probably  to  the 
Dead  Sea,  but  possibly  not — and  then  strike  for  the  ocean 
and  rejoin  the  ship  three  or  four  weeks  hence  at  Joppa;  terms, 
'five  dollars  a  day  apiece,  in  gold,  and  everything  to  be  fur 
nished  by  the  dragoman.  They  said  we  would  live  as  well 
as  at  a  hotel.  I  had  read  something  like  that  before,  and  did 
not  shame  my  judgment  by  believing  a  word  of  it.  I  said 
nothing,  however,  but  packed  up  a  blanket  and  a  shawl 
to  sleep  in,  pipes  and  tobacco,  two  or  three  woolen  shirts, 
a  portfolio,  a  guide-book,  and  a  Bible.  I  also  took  along  a 
towel  and  a  cake  of  soap,  to  inspire  respect  in  the  Arabs,  who 
would  take  me  for  a  king  in  disguise. 

We  were  to  select  our  horses  at  3  P.M.  At  that  hour 
Abraham,  the  dragoman,  marshaled  them  before  us.  With 
all  solemnity  I  set  it  down  here,  that  those  horses  were  the 
hardest  lot  I  ever  did  come  across,  and  their  accoutrements 
were  in  exquisite  keeping  with  their  style.  One  brute  had  an 
eye  out;  another  had  his  tail  sawed  off  close,  like  a  rabbit, 
and  was  proud  of  it;  another  had  a  bony  ridge  running  from 
his  neck  to  his  tail,  like  one  of  those  ruined  aqueducts  one 
sees  about  Rome,  and  had  a  neck  on  him  like  a  bowsprit ;  they 
all  limped,  and  had  sore  backs,  and  likewise  raw  places  and 
old  scales  scattered  about  their  persons  like  brass  nails  in  a 
hair  trunk;  their  gaits  were  marvelous  to  contemplate,  and 
replete  with  variety — under  way  the  procession  looked  like  a 
fleet  in  a  storm.  It  was  fearful.  Blucher  shook  his  head  and 
said: 

"That  dragon  is  going  to  get  himself  into  trouble  fetching 
these  old  crates  out  of  the  hospital  the  way  they  are,  unless 
lie  has  got  a  permit." 


306  MARK  TWAIN 

I  said  nothing.  The  display  was  exactly  according  to  the 
guide-book,  and  were  we  not  traveling  by  the  guide-book? 
I  selected  a  certain  horse  because  I  thought  I  saw  him  shy, 
and  I  thought  that  a  horse  that  had  spirit  enough  to  shy  was 
not  to  be  despised. 

At  6  o'clock  P.  M.  we  came  to  a  halt  here  on  the  breezy 
summit  of  a  shapely  mountain  overlooking  the  sea,  and  the 
handsome  valley  where  dwelt  some  of  those  enterprising 
Phoenicians  of  ancient  times  we  read  so  much  about;  all 
around  us  are  what  were  once  the  dominions  of  *Hiram,  King 
of  Tyre,  who  furnished  timber  from  the  cedars  of  these 
Lebanon  hills  to  build  portions  of  King  Solomon's  Temple 
with. 

Shortly  after  six,  our  pack-train  arrived.  I  had  not  seen 
it  before,  and  a  good  right  I  had  to  be  astonished.  We  had 
nineteen  serving-men  and  twenty-six  pack-mules !  It  was  a 
perfect  caravan.  It  looked  like  one,  too,  as  it  wound  among- 
the  rocks.  I  wondered  what  in  the  very  mischief  we  wanted 
with  such  a  vast  turnout  as  that,  for  eight  men.  I  wondered 
awhile,  but  soon  I  began  to  long  for  a  tin  plate,  and  some  bacon 
and  beans.  I  had  camped  out  many  and  many  a  time  before, 
and  knew  just  what  was  coming.  I  went  off,  without  waiting 
for  serving-men,  and  unsaddled  my  horse,  and  washed  such 
portions  of  his  ribs  and  his  spine  as  projected  throught  his  hide, 
and  when  I  came  back,  behold  five  stately  circus-tents  were  up 
— tents  that  were  brilliant,  within,  with  blue  and  gold  and  crim 
son,  and  all  manner  of  splendid  adornment !  I  was  speechless. 
Then  they  brought  eight  little  iron  bedsteads,  and  set  them  up 
in  the  tents;  they  put  a  soft  mattress  and  pillows  and  good 
blankets  and  two  snow-white  sheets  on  each  bed.  Next,  they 
rigged  a  table  about  the  center-pole,  and  on  it  placed  pewter 
pitchers,  basins,  soap,  and  the  whitest  of  towels— one  set  for 
each  man ;  they  pointed  to  pockets  in  the  tent,  and  said  we  could 
put  our  small  trifles  in  them  for  convenience,  and  if  we  needed 
pins  or  such  things,  they  were  sticking  everywhere.  Then 
came  the  finshing  touch — they  spread  carpets  on  the  floor ;  I 
simply  said,  "If  you  call  this  camping  out,  all  right — but  it 
isn't  the  style  7  am  used  to;  my  little  baggage  that  I  brought 
along  is  at  a  discount." 

It  grew  dark,  and  they  put  candles  on  the  tables — candles 
set  in  bright,  new,  brazen  candlesticks.  And  soon  the  bell— 
a  genuine,  simon-pure  bell — rang,  and  we  were  invited  to  "the 
saloon."  I  had  thought  before  that  we  had  a  tent  or  so  too 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  307 

many,  but  now  here  was  one,  at  least,  provided  for ;  it  was  to 
be  used  for  nothing  but  an  eating-saloon.  Like  the  others,  it 
was  high  enough  for  a  family  of  giraffes  to  live  in,  and  was 
very  handsome  and  clean  and  bright-colored  within.  It  was  a 
gem  of  a  place.  A  table  for  eight,  and  eight  canvas  chairs ; 
a  table-cloth  and  napkins  whose  whiteness  and  whose  fineness 
laughed  to  scorn  the  things  we  were  used  to  in  the  great  ex 
cursion  steamer ;  knives  and  forks,  soup  plates,  dinner  plates — 
everything,  in  the  handsomest  kind  of  style.  It  was  wonderful ! 
And  they  call  this  camping  out.  Those  stately  fellows  in  baggy 
trousers  and  turbaned  fezes  brought  in  a  dinner  which  con 
sisted  of  roast  mutton,  roast  chicken,  roast  goose,  potatoes, 
bread,  tea,  pudding,  apples  and  delicious  grapes ;  the  viands 
were  better  cooked  than  any  we  had  eaten  for  weeks,  and  the 
table  made  a  finer  appearance,  with  its  large  German-silver 
candlesticks  and  other  finery,  than  any  table  we  had  sat  down 
to  for  a  good  while,  and  yet  that  polite  dragoman,  Abraham, 
came  bowing  and  apologizing  for  the  whole  affair,  on  account 
of  the  unavoidable  confusion  of  getting  under  way  for  a  very 
long  trip,  and  promising  to  do  a  great  deal  better  in  future! 

It  is  midnight  now,  and  we  break  camp  at  six  in  the  morn 
ing. 

They  call  this  camping  out.  At  this  rate  it  is  a  glorious 
privilege  to  be  a  pilgrim  to  the  Holy  Land. 


CHAPTER  XLII 

WE  are  camped  near  Temnin-ellFoka — a  name  which 
the  boys  have  simplified  a  good  deal,  for  the  sake  of 
convenience  in   spelling.     They  call   it  Jacksonville, 
It  sounds  a  little  strangely,  here  in  the  Valley  of  Lebanon,  but 
it  has  the  merit  of  being  easier  to  remember  than  the  Arabic 
name. 

COME    LIKE    SPIRITS,     SO    DEPART 

The  night  shall  be  filled  with  music, 
And  the  cares  that  infest  the  day 

Shall  unfold  their  tents  like  the  Arabs, 
And  as  silently  steal  away. 

I  slept  very  soundly  last  night,  yet  when  the  dragoman's  bell 
rang  at  half  past  five  this  morning  and  the  cry  went  abroad  of 
"Ten  minutes  to  dress  for  breakfast  1"  I  heard  both.  It  sur 
prised  me,  because  I  have  not  heard  the  breakfast  gong  in  the 
ship  for  a  month,  and  whenever  we  have  had  occasion  to  fire 
a  salute  at  daylight,  I  have  only  found  it  out  in  the  course  of 
conversation  afterward.  However,  camping  out,  even  though 
it  be  in  a  gorgeous  tent,  makes  one  fresh  and  lively  in  the 
morning — especially  if  the  air  you  are  breathing  is  the  cool, 
fresh  air  of  the  mountains. 

I  was  dressed  within  the  ten  minutes,  and  came  out.  The 
saloon  tent  had  been  stripped  of  its  sides,  and  had  nothing  lefti 
but  its  roof ;  so  when  we  sat  down  to  table  we  could  look  out 
over  a  noble  panorama  of  mountain,  sea,  and  hazy  valley.  And 
sitting  thus,  the  sun  rose  slowly  up  and  suffused  the  picture 
with  a  world  of  rich  coloring. 

Hot  mutton-chops,  fried  chicken,  omelettes,  fried  potatoes, 
and  coffee— all  excellent.  This  was  the  bill  of  fare.  It  was 
sauced  with  a  savage  appetite  purchased  by  hard  riding  the 
day  before,  and  refreshing  sleep  in  a  pure  atmosphere.  As  1 
called  for  a  second  cup  of  coffee,  I  glanced  over  my  shoulder, 
and^  behold,  our  white  village  was  gone— the  splendid  tents  had 
vanished  like  magic!  It  was  wonderful  how  quickly  those 
Arabs  had  "folded  their  tents";  and  it  was  wonderful,  also, 

308 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  309 

how  quickly  they  had  gathered  the  thousand  odds  and  ends 
of  the  camp  together  and  disappeared  with  them. 

By  half  past  six  we  were  under  way,  and  all  the  Syrian  world 
seemed  to  be  under  way  also.  The  road  was  rilled  with  mule- 
trains  and  long  processions  of  camels.  This  reminds  me  that 
we  have  been  trying  for  some  time  to  think  what  a  camel  looks 
like,  and  now  we  have  made  it  out.  When  he  is  clov/n  on  all 
his  knees,  flat  on  his  breast  to  receive  his  load,  he  looks  some 
thing  like  a  goose  swimming;  and  when  he  is  upright  he  looks 
like  an  ostrich  with  an  extra  set  of  legs.  Camels  are  not 
beautiful,  and  their  long  under-lip  gives  them  an  exceedingly 
"gallus"1  expression.  They  have  immense  flat,  forked  cush 
ions  of  feet,  that  make  a  track  in  the  dust  like  a  pie  with  a 
slice  cut  out  of  it.  They  are  not  particular  about  their  diet. 
They  would  eat  a  tombstone  if  they  could  bite  it.  A  thistle 
grows  about  here  which  has  needles  on  it  that  would  pierce 
through  leather,  I  think;  if  one  touches  you,  you  can  find  re 
lief  in  nothing  but  profanity.  The  camels  eat  these.  They 
show  by  their  actions  that  they  enjoy  them.  I  suppose  it 
would  be  a  real  treat  to  a  camel  to  have  a  keg  of  nails  for  sup 
per. 

While  I  am  speaking  of  animals,  I  will  mention  that  I  have 
a  horse  now  by  the  name  of  "Jer^cno-"  He  is  a  mare.  I  have 
seen  remarkable  horses  before,  but  none  so  remarkable  as 
this.  I  wanted  a  horse  that  could  shy,  and  this  one  fills  the 
bill.  I  had  an  idea  that  shying  indicated  spirit.  If  I  was 
correct,  I  have  got  the  most  spirited  horse  on  earth.  He  shies 
at  everything  he  comes  across,  with  the  utmost  impartiality. 
He  appears  to  have  a  mortal  dread  of  telegraph-poles,  especi 
ally;  and  it  is  fortunate  that  these  are  on  both  sides  of  the 
road,  because  as  it  is  now,  I  never  fall  off  twice  in  succession 
on  the  same  side.  If  I  fell  on  the  same  side  always,  it  would 
get  to  be  monotonous  after  a  while.  This  creature  has  scared 
at  everything  he  has  seen  to-day,  except  a  haystack.  He 
walked  up  to  that  with  intrepidity  and  a  recklessness  that  were 
astonishing.  And  it  would  fill  any  one  with  admiration  to 
see  how  he  preserves  his  self-possession  in  the  presence  of  a 
barley  sack.  This  dare  devil  bravery  will  be  the  death  of  this 
horse  some  day. 

He  is  not  particularly  fast,  but  I  think  he  will  get  me  through 
the  Holy  Land.  He  has  only  one  fault.  His  tail  has  been 
chopped  off  or  else  he  has  sat  down  on  it  too  hard,  some  time 
JExcuse  the  slang — no  other  word  will  describe  it. 


310  MARK  TWAIN 

or  other,  and  he  has  to  fight  the  flies  with  his  heels.  This 
is  all  very  well,  but  when  he  tries  to  kick  a  fly  off  the  top  of 
his  head  with  his  hind  foot,  it  is  too  much  variety.  He  is 
going  to  get  himself  into  trouble  that  way  some  day.  He 
reaches  around  and  bites  my  legs,  too.  I  do  not  care  partic 
ularly  about  that,  only  I  do  not  like  to  see  a  horse  too  soci 
able. 

I  think  the  owner  of  this  prize  had  a  wrong  opinion  about 
him.  He  had  an  idea  that  he  was  one  of  those  fiery,  untamed 
steeds,  but  he  is  not  of  that  character.  I  know  the  Arab  had 
this  idea,  because  when  he  brought  the  horse  out  for  inspec 
tion  in  Beirout,  he  kept  jerking  at  the  bridle  and  shouting  in 
Arabic,  "Whoa!  will  you?  Do  you  want  to  run  away;  you 
ferocious  beast,  and  break  your  neck?"  when  all  the  time  the 
horse  was  not  doing  anything  in  the  world,  and  only  looked 
like  he  wanted  to  lean  up  against  something  and  think.  When 
ever  he  is  not  shying  at  things,  or  reaching  after  a  fly,  he  wants 
to  do  that  yet.  How  it  would  surprise  his  owner  to  know  this. 

We  have  been  in  a  historical  section  of  country  all  day.  At 
noon  we  camped  three  hours  and  took  luncheon  at  Mekseh, 
near  the  junction  of  the  Lebanon  Mountains  and  the  Jebel  el 
Kuneiyiseh,  and  looked  down  into  the  immense,  level,  garden- 
like  Valley  of  Lebanon.  To-night  we  are  camping  near  the 
same  valley,  and  have  a  very  wide  sweep  of  it  in  view.  We 
can  see  the  long,  whale-backed  ridge  of  Mount  Hermon  pro 
jecting  above  the  eastern  hills.  The  "dews  of  Hermon"  are 
falling  upon  us  now,  and  the  tents  are  almost  soaked  with 
them. 

Over  the  way  from  us,  and  higher  up  the  valley,  we  can  dis 
cern,  through  the  glasses,  the  faint  outlines  of  the  wonderful 
ruins  of  Baalbec,  the  supposed  Baal-Gad  of  Scripture,  f 
Joshua  and  another  person  were  the  two  spies  who  were  sent 
into  this  land  of  Canaan  by  the  children  of  Israel  to  report 
upon  its  character — I  mean  they  were  the  spies  who  reported 
favorably.  They  took  back  with  them  some  specimens  of  the 
grapes  of  this  country,  and  in  the  children's  picture-books 
they  are  always  represented  as  bearing  one  monstrous  bunch 
swung  to  a  pole  between  them,  a  respectable  load  for  a  pack- 
train.  The  Sunday-school  books  exaggerated  it  a  little.  The 
grapes  are  most  excellent  to  this  day,  but  the  bunches  are  not 
as  large  as  those  in  the  pictures.  I  was  surprised  and  hurt 
when  I  saw  them,  because  those  colossal  bunches  of  grapes 
were  one  of  my  most  cherished  juvenile  traditions. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  311 

Joshua  reported  favorably,  and  the  children  of  Israel  jour 
neyed  on,  with  Moses  at  the  head  of  the  general  government, 
and  Joshua  in  command  of  the  army  of  six  hundred  thousand 
fighting  men.  Of  women  and  children  and  civilians  there  was 
a  countless  swarm.  Of  all  that  mighty  host,  none  but  the 
two  faithful  spies  ever  lived  to  set  their  feet  in  the  Promised 
Land.  They  and  their  descendants  wandered  forty  years  in 
the  desert,  and  then  Moses,  the  gifted  warrior,  poet,  states 
man,  and  philosopher,  went  up  into  Pisgah  and  met  his  myster 
ious  fate.  Where  he  was  buried  no  man  knows — for 

...    no  man  dug  that  sepulcher, 

And  no  man  saw  it  e'er — 
For  the  sons  of  God  upturned  the  sod 

And  laid  the  dead  man  there ! 

,  Then  Joshua  began  his  terrible  raid,  and  from  Jericho  clear 
to  this  Baal-Gad,  he  swept  the  land  like  the  Genius  of  De 
struction.  He  slaughtered  the  people,  laid  waste  their  soil,  and 
razed  their  cities  to  the  ground.  He  wasted  thirty-one  kings 
also.  One  may  call  it  that,  though  really  it  can  hardly  be 
called  wasting  them,  because  there  were  always  plenty  of  kings 
in  those  days,  and  to  spare.  At  any  rate,  he  destroyed  thirty- 
one  kings,  and  divided  up  their  realms  among  his  Israelites. 
He  divided  up  this  valley  stretched  out  here  before  us,  and  so 
it  was  once  Jewish  territory.  The  Jews  have  long  since  dis 
appeared  from  it,  however. 

Back  yonder,  an  hour's  journey  from  here,  we  passed 
through  an  Arab  village  of  stone  dry-goods  boxes  (they  look 
like  that),  where  Noah's  tomb  lies  under  lock  and  key.  [Noah 
built  the  ark.]  Over  these  old  hills  and  valleys  the  ark  that 
contained  all  that  was  left  of  a  vanished  world  once  floated. 

I  make  no  apology  for  detailing  the  above  information.  It 
will  be  news  to  some  of  my  readers,  at  any  rate. 

Noah's  tomb  is  built  of  stone,  and  is  covered  with  a  long 
stone  building.  Bucksheesh  let  us  in.  The  building  had  to  be 
long,  because  the  grave  of  the  honored  old  navigator  is  two 
hundred  and  ten  feet  long  itself !  It  is  only  about  four  feet 
high,  though.  He  must  have  cast  a  shadow  like  a  lightning- 
rod.  The  proof  that  this  is  the  genuine  spot  where  Noah  was 
buried  can  only  be  doubted  by  uncommonly  incredulous  people. 
The  evidence  is  pretty  straight.  Shem,  the  son  of  Noah,  was 
present  at  the  burial,  and  showed  the  place  to  his  descendants, 
transmitted  the  knowledge  to  their  descendants,  and  the 


312  MARK  TWAIN 

lineal  descendants  of  these  introduced  themselves  to  us  to-day. 
It  was  pleasant  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  members  of  so 
respectable  a  family.  It  was  a  thing  to  be  proud  of.  It  was 
the  next  thing  to  being  acquainted  with  Noah  himself. 

Noah's  memorable  voyage  will  always  possess  a  living  in 
terest  for  me,  henceforward. 

If  ever  an  oppressed  race  existed,  it  is  this  one  we  see  fet 
tered  around  us  under  the  inhuman  tyranny  of  the  Ottoman 
empire.  I  wish  Europe  would  let  Russia  annihilate  Turkey 
a  little — not  much,  but  enough  to  make  it  difficult  to  find  the 
place  again  without  a  divining-rod  or  a  diving-bell.  The 
Syrians  are  very  poor,  and  yet  they  are  ground  down  by  a 
system  of  taxation  that  would  drive  any  other  nation  frantic. 
Last  year  their  taxes  were  heavy  enough,  in  all  conscience— 
but  this  year  they  have  been  increased  by  the  addition  of  taxes 
that  were  forgiven  them  in  times  of  famine  in  former  years. 
On  top  of  this  the  government  had  levied  a  tax  of  one-tenth 
of  the  whole  proceeds  of  the  land.  This  is  only  half  the  story. 
The  Pasha  of  a  Pashalic  does  not  trouble  himself  with  ap 
pointing  tax-collectors.  He  figures  up  what  all  these  taxes 
ought  to  amount  to  in  a  certain  district.  Then  he  farms  the 
collection  out.  He  calls  the  rich  men  together,  the  highest 
bidder  gets  the  speculation,  pays  the  Pasha  on  the  spot,  and 
then  sells  out  to  smaller  fry,  who  sell  in  turn  to  a  piratical 
horde  of  still  smaller  fry.  These  latter  compel  the  peasant  to 
bring  his  little  trifle  of  grain  to  the  village,  at  his  own  cost, 
It  must  be  weighed,  the  various  taxes  set  apart,  and  the  re 
mainder  returned  to  the  producer.  But  the  collector  delays 
this  duty  day  after  day,  while  the  producer's  family  are  per 
ishing  for  bread ;  at  last  the  poor  wretch,  who  cannot  but  under 
stand  the  game,  says,  "Take  a  quarter— take  half— take  two- 
thirds  if  you  will,  and  let  me  go!"  It  is  a  most  outrageous 
state  of  things. 

_These  people  are  naturally  good-hearted  and  intelligent,  and, 
with  education  and  liberty,  would  be  a  happy  and  contented 
race.  They  often  appeal  to  the  stranger  to  know  if  the  great 
world  will  not  some  day  come  to  their  relief  and  save  them. 
The  Sultan  has  been  lavishing  money  like  water  in  England 
and  Paris,  but  his  subjects  are  suffering  for  it  now. 

This  fashion  of  camping  out  bewilders  me.  We  have  boot 
jacks  and  a  bathtub  now',  and  yet  all  the  mysteries  the  pack- 
mules  carry  are  not  revealed.  What  next? 


CHAPTER  XLIII 


\  ^  7^  ^a(^  a  tedious  ride  °f  about  five  hours,  in  the  sun, 
V/^y  across  the  Valley  of  Lebanon.  It  proved  to  be  not 
quite  so  much  of  a  garden  as  it  had  seemed  from  the 
hillsides.  It  was  a  desert,  weed-grown  waste,  littered  thickly 
with  stones  the  size  of  a  man's  fist.  Here  and  there  the  natives 
had  scratched  the  ground  and  reared  a  sickly  crop  of  grain,  but 
for  the  most  part  the  valley  was  given  up  to  a  handful  of 
shepherds,  whose  flocks  were  doing  what  they  honestly  could 
to  get  a  living,  but  the  chances  were  against  them.  We  saw 
rude  piles  of  stones  standing  near  the  roadside,  at  intervals, 
and  recognized  the  custom  of  marking  boundaries  which  ob- 

;  tained  in  Jacob's  time.  There  were  no  walls,  no  fences,  no 
hedges  —  nothing  to  secure  a  man's  possessions  but  these  ran 
dom  heaps  of  stones.  The  Israelites  held  them  sacred  in  the 

I  old  patriarchal  times,  and  these  other  Arabs,  their  lineal  des- 

.'  cendants,  do  so  likewise.  An  American,  of  ordinary  intelli 
gence,  would  soon  widely  extend  his  property,  at  an  outlay 
of  mere  manual  labor,  performed  at  night,  under  so  loose  a 
system  of  fencing  as  this. 

The  plows  these  people  use  are  simply  a  sharpened  stick, 
such  as  Abraham  plowed  with,  and  they  still  winnow  their 
wheat  as  he  did  —  they  pile  it  on  the  housetop,  and  then  toss 

;  it  by  shovelfuls  into  the  air  until  the  wind  has  blown  all  the 
chaff  away. 

We  had  a  fine  race,  of  a  mile,  with  an  Arab  perched  on  a 

|  camel.  Some  of  the  horses  were  fast,  and  made  very  good 
time,  but  the  camel  scampered  by  them  without  any  very  great 

1  effort.    The  yelling  and  shouting,  and  whipping  and  galloping, 

;  of  all  parties  interested,  made  it  an  exhilarating,  exciting,  and 
particularly  boisterous  race. 

At  eleven  o'clock,  our  eyes  fell  upon  the  walls  and  columns 
of  Baalbec,  a  noble  ruin  whose  history  is  a  sealed  book.  It 
has  stood  there  for  thousands  of  years,  the  wonder  and  admira 
tion  of  travelers;  but  who  built  it,  or  when  it  was  built,  are 
questions  that  may  never  be  answered.  One  thing  is  very 
sure,  though.  Such  grandeur  of  design,  and  such  grace  of 

313 


314  MARK  TWAIN 

execution,  as  one  sees  in  the  temples  of  Baalbec,  have  not  been 
equaled  or  even  approached  in  any  work  of  men's  hands  that 
has  been  built  within  twenty  centuries  past. 

The  great  Temple  of  the  Sun,  the  Temple  of  Jupiter,  and 
several  smaller  temples,  are  clustered  together  in  the  midst  of 
one  of  these  miserable  Syrian  villages,  and  look  strangely 
enough  in  such  plebeian  company.  These  temples  are  built 
upon  massive  substructions  that  might  support  a  world,  al 
most;  the  materials  used  are  blocks  of  stone  as  large  as  an 
omnibus — very  few,  if  any,  of  them  are  smaller  than  a  car 
penter's  tool  chest — and  these  substructions  are  traversed  by 
tunnels  of  masonry  through  which  a  train  of  cars  might  pass. 
With  such  foundations  as  these,  it  is  little  wonder  that  Baal- 
bee  has  lasted  so  long.  The  Temple  of  the  Sun  is  nearly  three 
hundred  feet  long  and  one  hundred  and  sixty  feet  wide.  It 
had  fifty- four  columns  around  it,  but  only  six  are  standing 
now — the  others  lie  broken  at  its  base,  a  confused  and  pic 
turesque  heap.  The  six  columns  are  perfect,  as  also  are  their 
bases,  Corinthian  capitals  and  entablature — and  six  more 
shapely  columns  do  not  exist.  The  columns  and  the  entabla 
ture  together  are  ninety  feet  high — a  prodigious  altitude  for 
shafts  of  stone  to  reach,  truly — and  yet  one  only  thinks  of 
their  beauty  and  symmetry  when  looking  at  them;  the  pillars 
look  slender  and  delicate,  the  entablature,  with  its  elaborate 
sculpture,  looks  like  rich  stucco-work.  But  when  you  have 
gazed  aloft  till  your  eyes  are  weary,  you  glance  at  the  great 
fragments  of  pillars  among  which  you  are  standing,  and  find 
that  they  are  eight  feet  through;  and  with  them  lie  beautiful 
capitals  apparently  as  large  as  a  small  cottage ;  and  also  single 
slabs  of  stone,  superbly  sculptured,  that  are  four  or  five  feet 
thick,  and  would  completely  cover  the  floor  of  any  ordinary 
parlor.  You  wonder  where  these  monstrous  things  came  f  ronj, 
and  it  takes  some  little  time  to  satisfy  yourself  that  the  airy 
and  graceful  fabric  that  towers  above  your  head  is  made  up 
of  their  mates.  It  seems  too  preposterous. 

The  Temple  of  Jupiter  is  a  smaller  ruin  than  the  one  I 
have  been  speaking  of,  and  yet  is  immense.  It  is  in  a  tolerable 
state  of  preservation.  One  row  of  nine  columns  stands  al 
most  uninjured.  They  are  sixty-five  feet  high  and  support  a 
sort  of  porch  or  roof,  which  connects  them  with  the  roof  of 
the  building.  This  porch-roof  is  composed  of  tremendous 
slabs  of  stone,  which  are  so  finely  sculptured  on  the  under 
side  that  the  work  looks  like  a  fresco  from  below.  One  or  two 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  315 

of  these  slabs  had  fallen,  and  again  I  wondered  if  the  gigantic 
masses  of  carved  stone  that  lay  about  me  were  no  larger  than 
those  above  my  head.  Within  the  temple,  the  ornamentation 
was  elaborate  and  colossal.  What  a  wonder  of  architectural 
beauty  and  grandeur  this  edifice  must  have  been  when  it  was 
new!  ^And  what  a  noble  picture  it  and  its  statelier  compan 
ion,  with  the  chaos  of  mighty  fragments  scattered  about  them, 
yet  make  in  the  moonlight! 

I  cannot  conceive  how  these  immense  blocks  of  stones  were 
ever  hauled  from  the  quarries,  or  how  they  were  ever  raised 
to  the  dizzy  heights  they  occupy  in  the  temples.  And  yet  these 
sculptured  blocks  are  trifles  in  size  compared  with  the  rough- 
hewn  blocks  that  form  the  wide  veranda  or  platform  which 
surrounds  the  Great  Temple.  One  stretch  of  that  platform, 
two  hundred  feet  long,  is  composed  of  blocks  of  stone  as  large 
and  some  of  them  larger,  than  a  street-car.  They  surmount  a 
wall  about  ten  or  twelve  feet  high.  I  thought  those  were 
large  rocks,  but  they  sank  into  insignificance  compared  with 
those  which  formed  another  section  of  the  platform.  These 
were  three  in  number,  and  I  thought  that  each  of  them  was 
about  as  long  as  three  street-cars  placed  end  to  end,  though, 
of  course,  they  are  a  third  wider  and  a  third  higher  than  a 
street-car.  Perhaps  two  railway  freight-cars  of  the  largest 
pattern,  placed  end  to  end,  might  better  represent  their  size. 
In  combined  length  these  three  stones  stretch  nearly  two  hun 
dred  feet;  they  are  thirteen  feet  square;  two  of  them  are 
sixty- four  feet  long  each,  and  the  third  is  sixty-nine.  They 
are  built  into  the  massive  wall  some  twenty  feet  above  the 
ground.  They  are  there,  but  how  they  got  there  is  the  ques 
tion.  I  have  seen  the  hull  of  a  steamboat  that  was  smaller 
than  one  of  those  stones.  All  these  great  walls  are  as  exact 
and  shapely  as  the  flimsy  things  we  build  of  bricks  in  these 
days.  A  race  of  gods  or  of  giants  must  have  inhabited  Baal- 
bee  many  a  century  ago.  Men  like  the  men  of  our  day  could 
hardly  rear  such  temples  as  these. 

We  went  to  the  quarry  from  whence  the  stones  of  Baalbec 
were  taken.  It  was  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  off,  and  down 
hill.  In  a  great  pit  lay  the  mate  of  the  largest  stone  in  the 
ruins.  It  lay  there  just  as  the  giants  of  that  old  forgotten 
time  had  left  it  when  they  were  called  hence — just  as  they  had 
left  it,  to  remain  for  thousands  of  years,  an  eloquent  rebuke 
unto  such  as  are  prone  to  think  slightingly  of  the  men  who  lived 
before  them.  This  enormous  block  lies  there,  squared  and 


316  MARK  TWAIN 

ready  for  the  builders'  hands— a  solid  mass  fourteen  feet  by 
seventeen,  and  but  a  few  inches  less  than  seventy  feet  long! 
Two  buggies  could  be  driven  abreast  of  each  other,  on  its  sur 
face,  from  one  end  of  it  to  the  other,  and  leave  room  enough 
for  a  man  or  two  to  walk  on  either  side. 

One  might  swear  that  all  the  John  Smiths  and  George  Wil 
kinsons,  and  all  the  other  pitiful  nobodies  between  Kingdom 
Come  and  Baalbec  would  inscribe  their  poor  little  names  upon 
the  walls  of  Baalbec's  magnificent  ruins,  and  would  add  the 
town,  the  county,  and  the  state  they  came  from — and,  swear 
ing  thus  be  infallibly  correct.  It  is  a  pity  some  great  ruin  does 
not  fall  in  and  flatten  out  some  of  these  reptiles,  and  scare 
their  kind  out  of  ever  giving  their  names  to  fame  upon  any 
walls  or  monuments  again,  forever. 

Properly,  with  the  sorry  relics  we  bestrode,  it  was  a  three 
days'  journey  to  Damascus.  It  was  necessary  that  we  should 
do  it  in  less  than  two.  It  was  necessary  because  our  three 
pilgrims  would  not  travel  on  the  Sabbath  day.  We  were  all 
perfectly  willing  to  keep  the  Sabbath  day,  but  there  are  times 
when  to  keep  the  letter  of  a  sacred  law  whose  spirit  is  right 
eous,  becomes  a  sin,  and  this  was  a  case  in  point.  We  pleaded 
for  the  tired,  ill-treated  horses,  and  tried  to  show  that  their 
faithful  service  deserved  kindness  in  return,  and  their  hard 
lot  compassion.  But  when  did  ever  self-righteousness  know  the 
sentiment  of  pity?  What  were  a  few  long  hours  added  to  the 
hardships  of  some  overtaxed  brutes  when  weighed  against  the 
peril  of  those  human  souls?  It  was  not  the  most  promising- 
party  to  travel  with  and  hope  to  gain  a  higher  veneration  for 
religion  through  the  example  of  its  devotees.  We  said  the 
Saviour,  who  pitied  dumb  beasts  and  taught  that  the  ox  mu^t 
be  rescued  from  the  mire  even  on  the  Sabbath  day,  would  not 
have  counseled  a  forced  march  like  this.  We  said  the  "long 
trip"  was  exhausting  and  therefore  dangerous  in  the  blistering 
heats  of  summer,  even  when  the  ordinary  day's  stages  were 
traversed,  and  if  we  persisted  in  this  hard  march,  some  of  us 
might  be  stricken  down  with  the  fevers  of  the  country  in  con- 
sequence  of  it.  Nothing  could  move  the  pilgrims.  They  must 
press  on.  Men  might  die,  horses  might  die,  but  they  must 
enter  upon  holy  soil  next  week,  with  no  Sabbath-breaking  stain 
upon  them.  Thus  they,  were  willing  to  commit  a  sin  against 
the  spirit  of  religious  law,  in  order  that  they  might  preserve 
the  letter  of  it.  It  was  not  worth  while  to  tell  them  "the 
letter  kills."  I  am  talking  now  about  personal  friends;  men 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  317 

whom  I  like ;  men  who  are  good  citizens ;  who  are  honorable, 
upright,  conscientious:  but  whose  idea  of  the  Saviour's  relig 
ion  seems  to  me  distorted.  They  lecture  our  shortcomings  un 
sparingly,  and  every  night  they  call  us  together  and  read  to 
us  chapters  from  the  Testament  that  are  full  of  gentleness,  of 
charity,  and  of  tender  mercy;  and  then  all  the  next  day  they 
stick  to  their  saddles  clear  up  to  the  summits  of  these  rugged 
mountains,  and  clear  down  again.  Apply  the  Testament's 
gentleness,  and  charity,  and  tender  mercy  to  a  toiling,  worn, 
and  weary  horse?  Nonsense — these  are  for  God's  human 
creatures,  not  His  dumb  ones.  What  the  pilgrims  choose  to 
do,  respect  for  their  almost  sacred  character  demands  that  I 
should  allow  to  pass — but  I  would  like  to  catch  any  other 
member  of  the  party  riding  his  horse  up  one  of  these  exhaust 
ing  hills  once ! 

,  We  have  given  the  pilgrims  a  good  many  examples  that  might 
benefit  them,  but  it  is  virtue  thrown  away.  They  have  never 
heard  a  cross  word  out  of  our  lips  towards  each  other — but 
they  have  quarreled  once  or  twice.  Wre  love  to  hear  them  at  it, 
after  they  have  been  lecturing  us.  The  very  first  thing  they 
did,  coming  ashore  at  Beirout,  was  to  quarrel  in  the  boat. 
I  have  said  I  like  them,  and  I  do  like  them — but  every  time 
they  read  me  a  scorcher  of  a  lecture  I  mean  to  talk  back  in 
print. 

Not  content  with  doubling  the  legitimate  stages,  they 
switched  off  the  main  road  and  went  away  out  of  the  way 
to  visit  an  absurd  fountain  called  Figia,  because  Balaam's  ass 
had  drank  there  once.  So  we  journeyed  on,  through  the  ter 
rible  hills  and  deserts  and  the  roasting  sun,  and  then  far  into 
the  night,  seeking  the  honored  pool  of  Baalam's  ass,  the  patron 
saint  of  all  pilgrims  like  us.  I  find  no  entry  but  this  in  my 
note-book : 

Rode  to-day,  altogether,  thirteen  hours,  through  deserts,  partly, 
and  partly  over  barren,  unsightly  hills,  and  latterly  through  wild, 
rocky  scenery,  and  camped  at  about  eleven  o'clock  at  night  on  the  banks 
of  a  limpid  stream,  near  a  Syrian  village.  Do  not  know  its  name — 
do  not  wish  to  know  it — want  to  go  to  bed.  Two  horses  lame  (mine 
and  Jack's)  and  the  others  worn  out.  Jack  and  I  walked  three  or 
four  miles,  over  the  hills,  and  led  the  horses.  Fun— but  of  a  mild  type. 

Twelve  or  thirteen  hours  in  the  saddle,  even  in  a  Christian 
land  and  a  Christian  climate,  and  on  a  good  horse,  is  a  tire 
some  journey ;  but  in  an  oven  like  Syria,  in  a  ragged  spoon  of 


318  MARK  TWAIN 

a  saddle  that  slips  fore-and-aft,  and  "thort-ships,"  and  every 
way,  and  on  a  horse  that  is  tired  and  lame,  and  yet  must  be 
whipped  and  spurred  with  hardly  a  moment's  cessation  all  day 
long,  till  the  blood  comes  from  his  side,  and  your  conscience 
hurts  you  every  time  you  strike,  if  you  are  half  a  man, — it  is 
a  journey  to  be  remembered  in  bitterness  of  spirit  and  exe 
crated  with  emphasis  for  a  liberal  division  of  a  man's  life 
time. 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

THE  next  day  was  an  outrage  upon  men  and  horses  both. 
It  was  another  thirteen-hour  stretch  (including  an 
hour's  "nooning").  It  was  over  the  barrenest  chalk- 
hills  and  through  the  baldest  canons  that  even  Syria  can  show. 
The  heat  quivered  in  the  air  everywhere.  In  the  canons  we  al 
most  smothered  in  the  baking  atmosphere.  On  high  ground, 
the  reflection  from  the  chalk-hills  was  blinding.  It  was  cruel  to 
urge  the  crippled  horses,  but  it  had  to  be  done  in  order  to  make 
Damascus  Saturday  night.  We  saw  ancient  tombs  and  temples 
of  fanciful  architecture  carved  out  of  the  solid  rock  high  up  in 
the  face  of  precipices  above  our  heads,  but  we  had  neither 
time  nor  strength  to  climb  up  there  and  examine  them.  The 
terse  language  of  my  note-book  will  answer  for  the  rest  of 
this  day's  experiences : 

Broke  camp  at  7  A.M.,  and  made  a  ghastly  trip  through  the  Zeb 
Dana  valley  and  the  rough  mountains — horses  limping  and  that  Arab 
screech-owl  that  does  most  of  the  singing  and  carries  the  water-skins, 
always  a  thousand  miles  ahead  of  course,  and  no  water  to  drink — will 
he  never  die?  Beautiful  stream  in  a  chasm,  lined  thick  with  pome 
granate,  fig,  olive,  and  quince  orchards,  and  nooned  an  hour  at  the 
celebrated  Balaam's  Ass  Fountain  of  Figia,  second  in  size  in  Syria, 
and  the  coldest  water  out  of  Siberia — guide-books  do  not  say  Balaam's 
ass  ever  drank  there — somebody  been  imposing  on  the  pilgrims,  maybe. 
Bathed  in  it — Jack  and  I.  Only  a  second — ice-water.  It  is  the  principal 
source  of  the  Abana  River — only  one-half  mile  down  to  where  it  joins. 
Beautiful  place — giant  trees  all  around — stf  shady  and  cool,  if  one 
could  keep  awake — vast  stream  gushes  straight  out  from  under  the 
mountain  in  a  torrent.  Over  it  is  a  rery  ancient  ruin,  with  no  known 
history — supposed  to  have  been  for  the  worship  of  the  deity  of  the 
fountain  or  Balaam's  ass  or  somebody.  Wretched  nest  of  human 
vermin  about  the  fountain — rags,  dirt,  sunken  cheeks,  pallor  of  sick 
ness,  sores,  projecting  bones,  dull,  aching  misery  in  their  eyes  and 
ravenous  hunger  speaking  from  every  eloquent  fiber  and  muscle  from 
head  to  foot.  How  they  sprang  upon  a  bone,  how  they  crunched  the 
bread  we  gave  them!  Such  as  these  to  swarm  about  one  and  watch 
every  bite  he  takes  with  greedy  looks,  and  swallow  unconsciously  every 
time  he  swallows,  as  if  they  half  fancied  the  precious  morsel  went 
down  their  own  throats — hurry  up  the  caravan ! — I  never  shall  enjoy 
a  meal  in  this  distressful  country.  To  think  of  eating  three  times  every 

319 


320  MARK  TWAIN 

day  under  such  circumstances  for  three  weeks  yet— it  is  worse  pun 
ishment  than  riding  all  day  in  the  sun.  There  are  sixteen  starving 
babies  from  one  to  six  years  old  in  the  party,  and  their  legs  are  no 
larger  than  broom-handles.  Left  the  fountain  at  1  P.M.,  (the  fountain 
took  us  at  least  two  hours  out  of  our  way),  and  reached  Mohammed's 
lookout  perch,  over  Damascus,  in  time  to  get  a  good  long  look  before 
it  was  necessary  to  move  on.  Tired?  Ask  of  the  winds  that  far  away 
with  fragments  strewed  the  sea. 

As  the  glare  of  day  mellowed  into  twilight,  we  looked  down 
upon  a  picture  which  is  celebrated  all  over  the  world.  I  think 
I  have  read  about  four  hundred  times  that  when  Mohammed 
was  a  simple  camel-driver  he  reached  this  point  and  looked 
down  upon  Damascus  for  the  first  time,  and  then  made  a 
certain  renowned  remark.  He  said  man  could  enter  only  one 
paradise;  he  preferred  to  go  to  the  one  above.  So  he  sat 
down  there  and  feasted  his  eyes  upon  the  earthly  paradise  of 
Damascus,  and  then  went  away  without  entering  its  gates. 
They  have  erected  a  tower  on  the  hill  to  mark  the  spot  where 
he  stood. 

Damascus  is  beautiful  from  the  mountain.  It  is  beautiful 
even  to  foreigners  accustomed  to  a  luxuriant  vegetation,  and 
I  can  easily  understand  how  unspeakably  beautiful  it  must  be 
to  eyes  that  are  only  used  to  the  God-forsaken  barrenness  and 
desolation  of  Syria.  I  should  think  a  Syrian  would  go  wild 
with  ecstasy  when  such  a  picture  bursts  upon  him  for  the 
first  time. 

From  his  high  perch,  one  sees  before  him  and  below  him  a 
wall  of  dreary  mountains,  shorn  of  vegetation,  glaring  fiercely 
in  the  sun;  it  fences  in  a  level  desert  of  yellow  sand,  smooth 
as  velvet  and  threaded  far  away  with  fine  lines  that  stand  for 
roads,  and  dotted  with  creeping  mites  we  know  are  camel-? 
trains  and  journeying  men ;  right  in  the  midst  of  the  desert  is 
spread  a  billowy  expanse  of  green  foliage;  and  nestling  in  its 
heart  sits  the  great  white  city,  like  an  island  of  pearls  and 
opals  gleaming  out  of  a  sea  of  emeralds.  This  is  the  picture 
you  see  spread  far  below  you,  with  distance  to  soften  it,  the 
sun  to  glorify  it,  strong  contrasts  to  heighten  the  effects,  and 
over  it  and  about  it  a  drowsing  air  of  repose  to  spiritualize  it 
and  make  it  seem  rather  a  beautiful  estray  from  the  mysterious 
worlds  we  visit  in  dreams  than  a  substantial  tenant  of  our 
coarse,  dull  globe.  And  when  you  think  of  the  leagues  of 
blighted,  blasted,  sandy,  rocky,  sunburnt,  ugly,  dreary,  in 
famous  country  you  have  ridden  over  to  get  here,  you  think 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  321 

it  is  the  most  beautiful,  beautiful  picture  that  ever  human  eyes 
rested  upon  in  all  the  broad  universe !  If  I  were  to  go  to 
Damascus  again,  I  would  camp  on  Mohammed's  hill  about  a 
week,  and  then  go  away.  There  is  no  need  to  go  inside  the 
walls.  The  Prophet  was  wise  without  knowing  it  when  he  de 
cided  not  to  go  clown  into  the  paradise  of  Damascus. 

/There  is  an  honored  old  tradition  that  the  immense  garden 
which  Damascus  stands  in  was  the  Garden  of  Eden,  and 
modern  writers  have  gathered  up  many  chapters  of  evidence 
tending  to  show  that  it  really  was  the  Garden  of  Eden,  and 
that  the  rivers  Pharpar  and  Abana  are  the  "two  rivers"  that 
watered  Adam's  Paradise.  It  may  be  so,  but  it  is  not  para 
dise  now,  and  one  would  be  as  happy  outside  of  it  as  he  would 
be  likely  to  be  within.  It  is  so  crooked  and  cramped  and 
dirty  that  one  cannot  realize  that  he  is  in  the  splendid  city  he 
saw  from  the  hilltop.  The  gardens  are  hidden  by  high  mud- 
walls,  and  the  paradise  is  become  a  very  sink  of  pollution  and 
uncomelinessl)  Damascus  has  plenty  of  clear,  pure  water  in 
it,  though,  ana  this  is  enough,  of  itself,  to  make  an  Arab  think 
it  beautiful  and  blessed.  Water  is  scarce  in  blistered  Syria. 
We  run  railways  by  our  large  cities  in  America ;  in  Syria  they 
curve  the  roads  so  as  to  make  them  run  by  the  meager  little 
puddles  they  call  "fountains,"  and  which  are  not  found  oftener 
on  a  journey  than  every  four  hours.  But  the  "rivers"  of 
Pharpar  and  Abana  of  Scripture  (mere  creeks)  run  through 
Damascus,  and  so  every  house  and  every  garden  have  their 
sparkling  fountains  and  rivulets  of  water.  With  her  forest 
of  foliage  and  her  abundance  of  water,  Damascus  must  be  a 
wonder  of  wonders  to  the  Bedouin  from  the  deserts.  Damas 
cus  is  simply  an  oasis — that  is  what  it  is.  For  four  thousand 
years  its  waters  have  not  gone  dry  or  its  fertility  failed.  Now 
we  can  understand  why  the  city  has  existed  so  long.  It  could 
not  die.  So  long  as  its  waters  remain  to  it  away  out  there  in 
the  midst  of  that  howling  desert,  so  long  will  Damascus  live 
to  bless  the  sight  of  the  tired  and  thirsty  wayfarer. 

Though  old  as  history  itself,  thou  art  fresh  as  the  breath  of  spring, 
blooming  as  thine  own  rose-bud,  and  fragrant  as  thine  own  orange 
flower,  O  Damascus,  pearl  of  the  East ! 

Damascus  dates  back  anterior  to  the  days  of  Abraham,  and 
is  the  oldest  city  in  the  world.  It  was  founded  by  Uz,  the 
grandson  of  Noah.  "The  early  history  of  Damascus  is 


322  MARK  TWAIN 

shrouded  in  the  mists  of  a  hoary  antiquity."  Leave  the  mat 
ters  written  of  in  the  first  eleven  chapters  of  the  Old  Testa 
ment  out,  and  no  recorded  event  has  occurred  in  the  world 
but  Damascus  was  in  existence  to  receive  the  news  of  it.  (Go 
back  as  far  as  you  will  into  the  vague  past,  there  was  always  a 
Damascus.  In  the  writings  of  every  century  for  more  than 
four  thousand  years,  its  name  has  been  mentioned  and  its 
praises  sung.  To  Damascus,  years  are  only  moments,  de- 

\  cades  are  only  flitting  trifles  of  time.  She  measures  time,  not 
by  days  and  months  and  years,  but  by  the  empires  she  has 
seen  rise  and  prosper  and  crumble  to  ruin.  She  is  a  type  of 

'  immortality*.^  She  saw  the  foundations  of  Baalbec,  and  Thebes, 
and  Ephestfs  laid;  she  saw  these  villages  grow  into  mighty 
cities,  and  amaze  the  world  with  their  grandeur — and  she  has 
lived  to  see  them  desolate,  deserted,  and  given  over  to  the  owls 
and  the  bats.  She  saw  the  Israelitish  empire  exalted,  and  she 
saw  it  annihilated.  She  saw  Greece  rise,  and  flourish  two 
thousand  years,  and  die.  In  her  old  age  she  saw  Rome  built; 
she  saw  it  overshadow  the  world  with  its  power;  she  saw  it 
perish.  The  few  hundreds  of  years  of  Genoese  and  Venetian 
might  and  splendor  were,  to  grave  old  Damascus,  only  a 
trifling  scientillation  hardly  worth  remembering.  ^Damascus  has 
seen  all  that  has  ever  occurred  on  earth,  and  still  she  lives.  She 
has  looked  upon  the  dry  bones  of  a  thousand  empires,  and  will 
see  the  tombs  of  a  thousand  more  before  she  dies.  Though 
another  claims  the  name,  old  Damascus  is  by  right  the  Eternal 
City.) 

Vve  reached  the  city  gates  just  at  sundown.  They  do  say 
that  one  can  get  into  any  walled-city  of  Syria,  after  night,  for 
bucksheesh,  except  Damascus.  (But  Damascus,  with  its  four 

1|  thousand  years  of  respectability  in  the  world,  has  many  old) 
jfogy  notions.  There  are  no  street-lamps  there,  and  the  law 
I  compels  all  who  go  abroad  at  night  to  carry  lanterns,  just  as 
/  was  the  case  in  old  days,  when  heroes  and  heroines  of  the 
'  Arabian  Nights  walked  the  streets  oj  Damascus,  or  flew  away 
toward  Bagdad  on  enchanted  carpets^ 

It  was  fairly  dark  a  few  minutes  after  we  got  within  the 
wall,  and  we  rode  long  distances  through  wonderfully  crooked 
streets,  eight  to  ten  feet  wide,  and  shut  in  on  either  side  by 
the  high  mud-walls  of  the  gardens.  At  last  we  got  to  where 
lanterns  could  be  seen  flitting  about  here  and  there,  and  knew 
we  were  in  the  midst  of  the  curious  old  city.  In  a  little  nar 
row  street,  crowded  with  our  pack-mules  and  with  a  swarm  of 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  323 

uncouth  Arabs,  we  alighted,  and  through  a  kind  of  a  hole  in 
the  wall  entered  the  hotel.  We  stood  in  a  great  flagged  court, 
with  flowers  and  citron  trees  about  us,  and  a  huge  tank  in  the 
center  that  was  receiving  the  waters  of  many  pipes.  We 
crossed  the  court  and  entered  the  rooms  prepared  to  receive 
four  of  us.  In  a  large  marble-paved  recess  between  the  two 
rooms  was  a  tank  of  clear,  cool  water,  which  was  kept  run 
ning  over  all  the  time  by  the  streams  that  were  pouring  into 
it  from  half  a  dozen  pipes.  Nothing  in  this  scorching,  deso 
late  land  could  look  so  refreshing  as  this  pure  water  flashing 
in  the  lamplight;  nothing  could  look  so  beautiful,  nothing 
could  sound  so  delicious  as  this  mimic  rain  to  ears  long  un 
accustomed  to  sounds  of  such  a  nature.  Our  rooms  were  large, 
comfortably  furnished,  and  even  had  their  floors  clothed  with 
soft,  cheerful-tinted  carpets.  It  was  a  pleasant  thing  to  see 
a  carpet  again,  for  if  there  is  anything  drearier  than  the  tomb- 
like,  stone-paved  parlors  and  bedrooms  of  Europe  and  Asia,  I 
do  not  know  what  it  is.  They  make  one  think  of  the  grave 
all  the  time.  A  very  broad,  gaily  caparisoned  divan,  some 
twelve  or  fourteen  feet  long,  extended  across  one  side  of  each 
room,  and  opposite  were  single  beds  with  spring  mattresses. 
There  were  great  looking-glasses  and  marble-top  tables.  All 
this  luxury  was  as  grateful  to  systems  and  senses  worn  out 
with  an  exhausting  day's  travel,  as  it  was  unexpected — for 
one  cannot  tell  what  to  expect  in  a  Turkish  city  of  even  a 
quarter  of  a  million  inhabitants. 

I  do  not  know,  but  I  think  they  used  that  tank  between  the 
rooms  to  draw  drinking-water  from ;  that  did  not  occur  to  me, 
however,  until  I  had  dipped  my  baking  head  far  down  into  its 
cool  depths.  I  thought  of  it  then,  and,  superb  as  the  bath 
was,  I  was  sorry  I  had  taken  it,  and  was  about  to  go  and  ex 
plain  to  the  landlord.  But  a  finely  curled  and  scented  poodle 
dog  frisked  up  and  nipped  the  calf  of  my  leg  just  then,  and 
before  I  had  time  to  think  I  had  soused  him  to  the  bottom  of 
the  tank,  and  when  I  saw  a  servant  coming  with  a  pitcher  I 
went  off  and  left  the  pup  trying  to  climb  out  and  not  succeed 
ing  very  well.  Satisfied  revenge  was  all  I  needed  to  make  me 
perfectly  happy,  and  when  I  walked  in  to  supper  that  first 
night  in  Damascus  I  was  in  that  condition.  We  lay  on  those 
divans  a  long  time,  after  supper,  smoking  narghilis  and  long- 
stemmed  chibouks,  and  talking  about  the  dreadful  ride  of  the 
jlay,  and  I  knew  then  what  I  had  sometimes  known  before — 


324  MARK  TWAIN 

that  it  is  worth  while  to  get  tired  out,  because  one  so  enjoys 
resting  afterward. 

In  the  morning  we  sent  for  donkeys.  It  is  worthy  of  note 
that  we  had  to  send  for  these  things.  I  said  Damascus  was 
an  old  fossil,  and  she  is.  Anywhere  else  we  would  have 
been  assailed  by  a  clamorous  army  of  donkey-drivers,  guides, 
peddlers,  and  beggars — but  in  Damascus  they  so  hate  the  very 
sight  of  a  foreign  Christian  that  they  want  no  intercourse 
whatever  with  him ;  only  a  year  or  two  ago,  his  person  was  not 
always  safe  in  Damascus  streets.  It  is  the  most  fanatical 
Mohammedan  purgatory  out  of  Arabia.  Where  you  see  one 
green  turban  of  a  Hadji  elsewhere  (the  honored  sign  that  my 
lord  has  made  the  pilgrimage  to  Mecca),  I  think  you  will  see 
a  dozen  in  Damascus.  The  Damascenes  are  the  ugliest,  wicked 
est  looking  villains  we  have  seen.  All  the  veiled  women  we 
had  seen  yet,  nearly,  left  their  eyes  exposed,  but  numbers  of 
these  in  Damascus  completely  hid  the  face  under  a  close- 
drawn  black  veil  that  made  the  women  look  like  a  mummy.  If 
ever  we  caught  an  eye  exposed  it  was  quickly  hidden  from 
our  contaminating  Christian  vision ;  the  beggars  actually 
passed  us  by  without  demanding  buchsheesh ;  the  merchants  in 
the  bazars  did  not  hold  up  their  goods  and  cry  out  eagerly, 
"Hey,  John !"  or  "Look  this,  Howaj  ji !"  On  the  contrary,  they 
only  scowled  at  us  and  said  never  a  word. 

The  narrow  streets  swarmed  like  a  hive  with  men  and 
women  in  strange  Oriental  costumes,  and  our  small  donkeys 
knocked  them  right  and  left  as  we  plowed  through  them, 
urged  on  by  the  merciless  donkey-boys.  These  persecutors 
run  after  the  animals,  shouting  and  goading  them  for  hours 
together;  they  keep  the  donkey  in  a  gallop  always,  yet  neve*- 
get  tired  themselves  or  fall  behind.  The  donkeys  fell  down, 
and  spilt  us  over  their  heads  occasionally,  but  there  was  noth-- 
ing  for  it  but  to  mount  and  hurry  on  again.  We  were  banged 
against  sharp  corners,  loaded  porters,  camels,  and  citizens  gen 
erally  ;  and  we  were  to  taken  up  with  looking  out  for  collisions 
and  casualties  that  we  had  no  chance  to  look  about  us  at  all. 
We  rode  half  through  the  city  and  through  the  famous  "street 
which  is  called  Straight"  without  seeing  anything,  hardly.  Our 
bones  were  nearly  knocked  out  of  joint,  we  were  wild  with  ex 
citement,  and  our  sides  ached  with  the  jolting  we  had  suf 
fered.  I  do  not  like  riding  in  the  Damascus  street-cars. 

We  were  on  our  way  to  the  reputed  houses  of  Judas  and 
Ananias.  About  eighteen  or  nineteen  hundred  years  ago,  Saul, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  325 

a  native  of  Tarsus,  was  particularly  bitter  against  the  new 
sect  called  Christians,  and  he  left  Jerusalem  and  started  across 
the  country  on  a  furious  crusade  against  them.  He  went  forth 
"breathing  threatenings  and  slaughter  against  the  disciples 
of  the  Lord." 

And  as  he  journeyed,  he  came  near  Damascus,  and  suddenly  there 
shined  round  about  him  a  light  from  heaven : 

And  he  fell  to  the  earth  and  heard  a  voice  saying  unto  him,  Saul, 
Saul,  why  persecutest  thou  me? 

And  when  he  knew  that  it  was  Jesus  that  spoke  to  him  he  trembled, 
and  was  astonished,  and  said,  Lord,  what  wilt  thou  have  me  to  do  ? 

He  was  told  to  arise  and  go  into  the  ancient  city  and  one 
would  tell  him  what  to  do.  In  the  mean  time  his  soldiers  stood 
speechless  and  awe-stricken,  for  they  heard  the  mysterious 
voice  but  saw  no  man.  Saul  rose  up  and  found  that  that 
^fierce  supernatural  light  had  destroyed  his  sight,  and  he  was 
blind,  so  "they  led  him  by  the  hand  and  brought  him 'to  Damas 
cus."  He  was  converted. 

Paul  lay  three  days  blind,  in  the  house  of  Judas,  and  dur 
ing  that  time  he  neither  ate  nor  drank. 

There  came  a  voice  to  a  citizen  of  Damascus,  named  Ananias, 
saying,  "Arise,  and  go  into  the  street  which  is  called  Straight, 
and  inquire  at  the  house  of  Judas,  for  one  called  Saul  of  Tar 
sus  ;  for  behold,  he  prayeth." 

Ananias  did  not  wish  to  go  at  first,  for  he  had  heard  of 
Saul  before,  and  he  had  his  doubts  about  that  style  of  a 
"chosen  vessel"  to  preach  the  gospel  of  peace.  However,  in 
obedience  to  orders,  he  went  into  the  "street  called  Straight" 
(how  he  ever  found  his  way  into  it,  and  after  he  did,  how  he 
ever  found  his  way  out  of  it  again,  are  mysteries  only  to  be  ac 
counted  for  by  the  fact  that  he  was  acting  under  Divine  in 
spiration).  He  found  Paul  and  restored  him,  and  ordained 
him  a  preacher ;  and  from  this  old  house  we  had  hunted  up  in 
the  street  which  is  miscalled  Straight,  he  had  started  out  on 
that  bold  missionary  career  which  he  prosecuted  till  his  death. 

It  was  not  the  house  of  the  disciple  who  sold  the  Master  for 
thirty  pieces  of  silver.  I  make  this  explanation  in  justice  to 
Judas,  who  was  a  far  different  sort  of  man  from  the  person 
just  referred  to.  A  very  different  style  of  man,  and  lived  in 
a  very  good  house.  It  is  a  pity  we  do  not  know  more  about 
him. 

I  have  given,  in  the  above  paragraphs,  some  more  in  forma- 


326  MARK  TWAIN 

tion  for  people  who  will  not  read  Bible  history  until  they  are 
defrauded  into  it  by  some  such  method  as  this.  I  hope  that 
no  friend  of  progress  and  education  will  obstruct  or  interfere 
with  my  peculiar  mission. 

The  street  called  Straight  is  straighter  than  a  corkscrew, 
but  not  as  straight  as  a  rainbow.  St.  Luke  is  careful  not  to 
commit  himself;  he  does  not  say  it  is  the  street  which  is 
straight,  but  the  "street  which  is  called  Straight."  It  is  a 
fine  piece  of  irony ;  it  is  the  only  facetious  remark  in  the  Bible, 
I  believe.  We  traversed  the  street  called  Straight  a  good  way, 
and  then  turned  off  and  called  at  the  reputed  house  of  An 
anias.  There  is  small  question  that  a  part  of  the  original  house 
is  there  still;  it  is  an  old  room  twelve  or  fifteen  feet  under 
ground,  and  its  masonry  is  evidently  ancient.  If  Ananias  did 
not  live  there  in  St.  Paul's  time,  somebody  else  did,  which  is 
just  as  well.  I  took  a  drink  out  of  Ananias's  well,  and  singu 
larly  enough,  the  water  was  just  as  fresh  as  if  the  well  had 
been  dug  yesterday. 

We  went  out  toward  the  north  end  of  the  city  to  see  the 
place  where  the  disciples  led  Paul  down  over  the  Damascus 
wall  at  dead  of  night — for  he  preached  Christ  so  fearlessly  in 
Damascus  that  the  people  sought  to  kill  him,  just  as  they 
would  to-day  for  the  same  offense,  and  he  had  to  escape  and 
flee  to  Jerusalem. 

Then  we  called  at  the  tomb  of  Mohammed's  children  and  at 
a  tomb  which  purported  to  be  that  of  St.  George  who  killed 
the  dragon,  and  so  on  out  of  the  hollow  place  under  a  rock 
where  Paul  hid  during  his  flight  till  his  pursuers  gave  him  up ; 
and  up  to  the  mausoleum  of  the  five  thousand  Chiistians  who 
were  massacred  in  Damascus  in  1861  by  the  Turks.  They 
say  those  narrow  streets  ran  blood  for  several  days,  and  that 
men,  women,  and  children  were  butchered  indiscriminately- 
and  left  to  rot  by  hundreds  all  through  the  Christian  quarter; 
they  say,  further,  that  the  stench  was  dreadful  All  the 
Christians  who  could  get  away  fled  from  the  city,  and  the 
Mohammedans  would  not  defile  their  hands  by  burying  the 
"infidel  dogs."  The  thirst  for  blood  extended  to  the  high 
lands  of  Hermon  and  Anti-Lebanon,  and  in  a  short  time 
twenty-five  thousand  more  Christians  were  massacred  and 
their  possessions  laid  waste.  How  they  hate  a  Christian  in 
Damascus !— and  pretty  much  all  over  Turkeydom  as  well. 
And  how  they  will  pay  for  it  when  Russia  turns  her  guns 
upon  them  again! 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  327 

It  is  soothing  to  the  heart  to  abuse  England  and  France 
for  interposing  to  save  the  Ottoman  Empire  from  the  destruc 
tion  it  has  so  richly  deserved  for  a  thousand  years.  It  hurts 
my  vanity  to  see  these  pagans  refuse  to  eat  of  food  that  has 
been  cooked  for  us ;  or  to  eat  from  a  dish  we  have  eaten  from ; 
or  to  drink  from  a  goatskin  which  we  have  polluted  with  our 
Christian  lips,  except  by  filtering  the  water  through  a  rag 
which  they  put  over  the  mouth  of  it  or  through  a  sponge !  (jt . 
never  disliked  a  Chinaman  as  I  do  these  degraded  Turks  and 
Arabs,  and,  when  Russia  is  ready  to  war  with  them  again,  I 
hope  England  and  France  will  not  find  it  good  breeding  or 
good  judgment  to  interfere?") 

In  Damascus  they  think  mere  are  no  such  rivers  in  all  the 
world  as  their  little  Abana  and  Pharpar.  The  Damascenes 
have  always  thought  that  way.  In  II  Kings,  chapter  v,  Naa- 
man  boasts  extravagantly  about  them.  That  was  three  thou 
sand  years  ago.  He  says :  "Are  not  Abana  and  Pharpar, 
rivers  of  Damascus,  better  than  all  the  waters  of  Israel  ?  May 
I  not  wash  in  them  and  be  clean?"  But  some  of  my  readers 
have  forgotten  who  Naaman  was,  long  ago.  Naaman  was 
the  commander  of  the  Syrian  armies.  He  was  the  favorite 
of  the  king  and  lived  in  great  state.  "He  was  a  mighty  man 
of  valor,  but  he  was  a  leper."  Strangely  enough,  the  house 
they  point  out  to  you  now  as  his  has  been  turned  into  a  leper 
hospital,  and  the  inmates  expose  their  horrid  deformities  and 
hold  up  their  hands  and  beg  for  bucksheesh  when  a  stranger 
enters. 

One  cannot  appreciate  the  horror  of  this  disease  until  he 
looks  upon  it  in  all  its  ghastlmess  in  Naaman's  ancient  dwell 
ing  in  Damascus.  Bones  all  twisted  out  of  shape,  great  knots 
protruding  from  face  and  body,  joints  decaying  and  dropping 
away — horrible ! 


ii 


CHAPTER  XLV 

THE  last  twenty- four  hours  we  stayed  in  Damascus  I 
lay  prostrate  with  a  violent  attack  of  cholera,  or 
cholera  morbus,  and  therefore  had  a  good  chance  and 
a  good  excuse  to  lie  there  on  that  wide  divan  and  take  an 
honest  rest.  I  had  nothing  to  do  but  listen  to  the  pattering  of 
the  fountains  and  take  medicine  and  throw  it  up  again.  It 
was  dangerous  recreation,  but  it  was  pleasanter  than  traveling 
in  Syria.  I  had  plenty  of  snow  from  Mount  Hermon,  and, 
as  it  would  not  stay  on  my  stomach,  there  was  nothing  to  inter 
fere  with  my  eating  it — there  was  always  room  for  more.  I 
enjoyed  myself  very  well.  Syrian  travel  has  its  interesting 
features,  like  travel  in  any  other  part  of  the  world,  and  yet 
to  break  your  leg  or  have  the  cholera  adds  a  welcome  variety 
to  it. 

We  left  Damascus  at  noon  and  rode  across  the  plain  a 
couple  of  hours,  and  then  the  party  stopped  awhile  in  the 
shade  of  some  fig  trees  to  give  me  a  chance  to  rest.  It  was 
the  hottest  day  we  had  seen  yet — the  sun-flames  shot  clown 
like  the  shafts  of  fire  that  stream  out  before  a  blowpipe;  the 
rays  seemed  to  fall  in  a  steady  deluge  on  the  head  and  pass 
downward  like  rain  from  a  roof.  I  imagined  I  could  distin 
guish  between  the  floods  of  rays — I  thought  I  could  tell  when 
each  flood  struck  my  head,  when  it  reached  my  shoulders,  and 
when  the  next  one  came.  It  was  terrible.  All  the  desert 
glared  so  fiercely  that  my  eyes  were  swimming  in  tears  all 
the  time.  The  boys  had  white  umbrellas  heavily  lined  with 
dark  green.  They  were  a  priceless  blessing.  I  thanked  for 
tune  that  I  had  one,  too,  notwithstanding  it  was  packed  up 
with  the  baggage  and  was  ten  miles  ahead.  It  is  madness 
to  travel  in  Syria  without  an  umbrella.  They  told  rne  in  Beir- 
out  (these  people  who  always  gorge  you  with  advice)  that 
it  was  madness  to  travel  in  Syria  without  an  umbrella.  It  was 
on  this  account  that  I  got  one. 

But,  honestly,  I  think. an  umbrella  is  a  nuisance  anywhere 
when  its  business  is  to  keep  the  sun  off.  No  Arab  wears  a 
brim  to  his  fez,  or  uses  an  umbrella,  or  anything  to  shade  his 

328 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  329 

eyes  or  his  face,  and  he  always  looks  comfortable  and  proper 
in  the  sun.  But  of  all  the  ridiculous  sights  I  ever  have  seen, 
our  party  of  eight  is  the  most  so — they  do  cut  such  an  out 
landish  figure.  They  travel  single  file;  they  all  wear  the  end 
less  white  rag  of  Constantinople  wrapped  round  and  round 
their  hats  and  dangling  down  their  backs;  they  all  wear  thick 
green  spectacles,  with  side-glasses  to  them;  they  all  hold  white 
umbrellas,  lined  with  green,  over  their  heads;  without  excep 
tion  their  stirrups  are  too  short — they  are  the  very  worst 
gang  of  horsemen  on  earth ;  their  animals  to  a  horse  trot  fear 
fully  hard— and  when  they  get  strung  out  one  after  the  other, 
glaring  straight  ahead  and  breathless;  bouncing  high  and  out 
of  turn,  all  along  the  line;  knees  well  up  and  stiff,  elbows 
flapping  like  a  rooster's  that  is  going  to  crow,  and  the  long 
file  of  umbrellas  popping  convulsively  up  and  down — when 
one  sees  this  outrageous  picture  exposed  to  the  light  of  day, 
he  is  amazed  that  the  gods  don't  get  out  their  thunderbolts 
and  destroy  them  off  the  face  of  the  earth!  I  do — I  wonder 
at  it.  I  wouldn't  let  any  such  caravan  go  through  a  country  of 
mine. 

And  when  the  sun  drops  below  the  horizon  and  the  boys 
close  their  umbrellas  and  put  them  under  their  arms,  it  is 
only  a  variation  of  the  picture,  not  a  modification  of  its  ab 
surdity, 

But  maybe  you  cannot  see  the  wild  extovagance  of  my 
panorama.  You  could  if  you  were  here,  fflere,  you  feel  all 
the  time  just  as  if  you  were  living  about  the  1200  before 
Christ — or  back  to  the  patriarchs — or  forward  to  the  New 
Era.  The  scenery  of  the  Bible  is  about  you — the  customs  of 
the  patriarchs  are  around  you — the  same  people,  in  the  same 
flowing  robes,  and  in  sandals,  cross  your  path — the  same  long 
trains  of  stately  camels  go  and  come — the  same  impressive 
religious  solemnity  and  silence  rest  upon  the  desert  and  the 
mountains  that  were  upon  them  in  the  remote  ages  of  antiq 
uity,  and  behold,  intruding  upon  a  scene  like  this,  comes  this 
fantastic  mob  of  green-spectacled  Yanks,  with  their  flapping 
elbows  and  bobbing  umbrellas!  It  is  Daniel  in  the  lion's  den 
with  a  green  cotton  umbrella  under  his  arm,  all  over  again^ 

My  umbrella  is  with  the  baggage,  and  so  are  my  green 
spectacles — and  there  they  shall  stay.  I  will  not  use  them. 
I  will  show  some  respect  for  the  eternal  fitness  of  things.  It 
will  be  bad  enough  to  get  sunstruck,  without  looking  ridiculous 


330  MARK  TWAIN 

into  the  bargain.     If  I  fall,  let  me  fall  bearing  about  me  the 
semblance  of  a  Christian,  at  least. 

Three  or  four  hours  out  from  Damascus  we  passed  the  spot 
where  Saul  was  so  abruptly  converted,  and  from  this  place  we 
looked  back  over  the  scorching  desert,  and  had  our  last  glimpse 
of  beautiful  Damascus,  decked  in  its  robes  of  shining  green, 
after  nightfall  we  reach  our  tents,  just  outside  of  the  nasty 
Arab  village  of  Jonesborough.  Of  course  the  real  name  oi 
the  place  is  El  something  or  other,  but  the  boys  still  refuse  to 
recognize  the  Arab  names  or  try  to  pronounce  them.  When 
I  say  that  that  village  is  of  the  usual  style,  I  mean  to  insinuate 
that  all  Syrian  villages  within  fifty  miles  of  Damascus  are 
alike— so  much  alike  that  it  would  require  more  than  human 
intelligence  to  tell  wherein  one  differed  from  another. 
Syrian  village  is  a  hive  of  huts  one  story  high  (the  height  of 
a  man),  and  as  square  as  a  dry-goods  box;  it  is  mud-plastered 
all  over,  flat  roof  and  all,  and  generally  whitewashed  after  a 
fashion.  The  same  roof  often  extends  over  half  the  town, 
covering  many  of  the  streets,  which  are  generally  about  a  yard 
wide.  When  you  ride  through  one  of  these  villages  at  noon 
day,  you  first  meet  a  melancholy  dog,  that  looks  up  at  you 
and  silently  begs  that  you  won't  run  over  him,  but  he  does 
not  offer  to  get  out  of  the  way;  next  you  meet  a  young  boy 
without  any  clothes  on,  and  he  holds  out  his  hand  and  says 
"Buchsheesh !" — he  don't  really  expect  a  cent,  but  then  he 
learned  to  say  that  before  he  learned  to  say  mother,  and  now 
he  cannot  break  himself  of  it;  next  you  meet  a  woman  with  a 
black  veil  drawn  closely  over  her  face,  and  her  busi  exposed ; 
finally,  you  come  to  several  sore-eyed  children  and  children  in 
all  stages  of  mutilation  and  decay;  and  sitting  humbly  in  the 
dust,  and  all  fringed  with  filthy  rags,  is  a  poor  devil  whose  - 
arms  and  legs  are  gnarled  and  twisted  like  grape  vines.  These 
are  all  the  people  you  are  likely  to  see.  The  balance  of  the 
population  are  asleep  within  doors,  or  abroad  tending  goats 
in  the  plains  and  on  the  hillsides.  The  village  is  built  on  some 
consumptive  little  watercourse,  and  about  it  is  a  little  fresh- 
looking  vegetation.  Beyond  this  charmed  circle,  for  miles  on 
every  side,  stretches  a  weary  desert  of  sand  and  gravel,  which 
produces  a  gray  bunchy  shrub  like  sage-brush.  A  Syrian 
village  is  the  sorriest  sight  in  the  world,  and  its  surroundings 
are  eminently  in  keeping  with  it. 

I  would  not  have  gone  into  this  dissertation  upon  Syrian 
villages  but  for  the  fact  that  Nimrod,  the  Mighty  Hunter  of 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  331 

Scriptural  notoriety,  is  buried  in  Jonesborough,  and  I  wished 
the  public  to  know  about  how  he  is  located.  Like  Homer,  he 
is  said  to  be  buried  in  many  other  places,  but  this  is  the  only 
true  and  genuine  place  his  ashes  inhabit. 

When  the  original  tribes  were  dispersed,  more  than  four 
thousand  years  ago,  Nimrod  and  a  large  party  traveled  three 
or  four  hundred  miles,  and  settled  where  the  great  city  of 
Babylon  afterward  stood.  Nimrod  built  that  city.  He  also 
began  to  build  the  famous  Tower  of  Babel,  but  circumstances 
over  which  he  had  no  control  put  it  out  of  his  power  to  finish 
it.  He  ran  it  up  eight  stories  high,  however,  and  two  of 
them  still  stand  at  this  day,  a  colossal  mass  of  brickwork,  rent 
down  the  center  by  earthquakes,  and  seared  and  vitrified  by 
the  lightnings  of  an  angry  God.  But  the  vast  ruin  will  still 
stand  for  ages,  to  shame  the  puny  labors  of  these  modern 
generations  of  men.  Its  huge  compartments  are  tenanted  by 
owls  and  lions,  and  old  Nimrod  lies  neglected  in  this  wretched 
village,  far  from  the  scene  of  his  grand  enterprise. 

We  left  Jonesborough  very  early  in  the  morning,  and  rode 
forever  and  forever  and  forever,  it  seemed  to  me,  over 
parched  deserts  and  rocky  hills,  hungry,  and  with  no  water 
to  drink.  We  had  drained  the  goatskin  dry  in  a  little  while. 
At  noon  we  halted  before  the  wretched  Arab  town  of  El  Yuba 
Dam,  perched  on  the  side  of  a  mountain,  but  the  dragoman 
said  if  we  applied  there  for  water  we  would  be  attacked  by 
the  whole  tribe,  for  they  did  not  love  Christians.  We  had  to 
journey  on.  Two  hours  later  we  reached  the  foot  of  a  tall 
isolated  mountain,  which  is  crowned  by  the  crumbling  castle 
of  Banias,  the  stateliest  ruin  of  that  kind  on  earth,  no  doubt. 
It  is  a  thousand  feet  long  and  two  hundred  wide,  all  of  the 
most  symmetrical,  and  at  the  same  time  the  most  ponderous, 
masonry.  The  massive  towers  and  bastions  are  more  than 
thirty  feet  high,  and  have  been  sixty.  From  the  mountain's 
peak  its  broken  turrets  rise  above  the  groves  of  ancient  oaks 
and  olives,  and  look  wonderfully  picturesque.  It  is  of  such 
high  antiquity  that  no  man  knows  who  built  it  or  when  it  was 
built.  It  is  utterly  inaccessible  except  in  one  place,  where  a 
bridle-path  winds  upward  among  the  solid  rocks  to  the  old 
portcullis.  The  horses'  hoofs  have  bored  holes  in  these  rocks 
to  the  depth  of  six  inches  during  the  hundreds  and  hundreds 
of  years  that  the  castle  was  garrisoned.  We  wandered  for 
three  hours  among  the  chambers  and  crypts  and  dungeons  of 
the  fortress,  and  trod  where  the  mailed  heels  of  many  a 


332  MARK  TWAIN 

knightly  Crusader  had  rung,  and  where  Phoenician  heroes  had 
walked  ages  before  them. 

We  wondered  how  such  a  solid  mass  of  masonry  could  be 
affected  even  by  an  earthquake,  and  could  not  understand  what 
agency  had  made  Banias  a  ruin;  but  we  found  the  destroyer, 
after  a  while,  and  then  our  wonder  was  increased  tenfold. 
Seeds  had  fallen  in  crevices  in  the  vast  walls;  the  seeds  had 
sprouted;  the  tender,  insignificant  sprouts  had  hardened;  they 
grew  larger  and  larger,  and  by  a  steady,  imperceptible  pres 
sure  forced  the  great  stones  apart,  and  now  are  bringing  sure 
destruction  upon  a  giant  work  that  has  even  mocked  the  earth 
quakes  to  scorn!  Gnarled  and  twisted  trees  spring  from  the 
old  walls  everywhere,  and  beautify  and  overshadow  the  gray 
battlements  with  a  wild  luxuriance  of  foliage. 

From  these  old  towers  we  looked  down  upon  a  broad,  far- 
reaching  green  plain,  glittering  with  the  pools  and  rivulets 
which  are  the  sources  of  the  sacred  river  Jordan.  It  was  a 
grateful  vision,  after  so  much  desert. 

And  as  the  evening  drew  near,  we  clambered  down  the 
mountain,  through  groves  of  the  Biblical  oaks  of  Bashan  (for 
we  were  just  stepping  over  the  border  and  entering  the  long- 
sought  Holy  Land),  and  at  its  extreme  foot,  toward  the  wide 
valley,  we  entered  this  little  execrable  village  of  Banias  and 
camped  in  a  great  grove  of  olive  trees  near  a  torrent  of 
sparkling  water  whose  banks  are  arrayed  in  fig  trees,  pome 
granates,  and  oleanders  in  full  leaf.  Barring  the  proximity 
of  the  village,  it  is  a  sort  of  paradise. 

The  very  first  thing  one  feels  like  doing  when  he  gets  into 
camp,  all  burning  up  and  dusty,  is  to  hunt  up  a  bath.  We  fol 
lowed  the  stream  up  to  where  it  gushes  out  of  the  mountain 
side,  three  hundred  yards  from  the  tents,  and  took  a  bath  that 
was  so  icy  that  if  I  did  not  know  this  was  the  main  source  of 
the  sacred  river,  I  would  expect  harm  to  come  of  it.  It  was 
bathing  at  noonday  in  the  chilly  source  of  the  Abana,  "River 
of  Damascus,"  that  gave  me  the  cholera,  so  Dr.  B.  said.  How 
ever,  it  generally  does  give  me  the  cholera  to  take  a  bath. 

The  incorrigible  pilgrims  have  come  in  with  their  pockets 
full  of  specimens  broken  from  the  ruins.  I  wish  this  vandal 
ism  could  be  stopped.  They  broke  off  fragments  from  Noah's 
tomb ;  from  the  exquisite  sculptures  of  the  temples  of  Baalbec ; 
from  the  houses  of  Judas  and  Ananias,  in  Damascus;  from  the 
tomb  of  Nimrod  the  Mighty  Hunter  in  Jonesborough;  from 
the  worn  Greek  and  Roman  inscriptions  set  in  the  hoary  walls 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  333 

of  the  castle  of  Banias  and  now  they  have  been  hacking  and 
chipping  these  old  arches  here  that  Jesus  looked  upon  in  the 
flesh.  Heaven  protect  the  Sepulcher  when  this  tribe  invades 
Jerusalem !  The  ruins  here  are  not  very  interesting.  There  are 
the  massive  walls  of  a  great  square  building  that  was  once  the 
citadel ;  there  are  many  ponderous  old  arches  that  are  so  smoth 
ered  with  debris  that  they  barely  project  above  the  ground ; 
there  are  heavy  walled  sewers  through  which  the  crystal 
brook  of  which  Jordan  is  born  still  runs;  in  the  hillside  are 
the  substructions  of  a  costly  marble  temple  that  Herod  the 
Great  built  here — patches  of  its  handsome  mosaic  floors  still 
remain ;  there  is  a  quaint  old  stone  bridge  that  was  here  before 
Herod's  time,  maybe;  scattered  everywhere,  in  the  paths  and 
in  the  woods,  are  Corinthian  capitals,  broken  porphyry  pil 
lars,  and  little  fragments  of  sculpture;  and  up  yonder  in  the 
precipice  where  the  fountain  gushes  out,  are  well-worn  Greek 
inscriptions  over  niches  in  the  rock  where  in  ancient  times 
the  Greeks,  and  after  them  the  Romans  worshipped  the  sylvan 
god  Pan.  But  trees  and  bushes  grow  above  many  of  these 
ruins  now;  the  miserable  huts  of  a  little  crew  of  filthy  Arabs 
are  perched  upon  the  broken  masonry  of  antiquity,  the  whole 
place  has  a  sleepy,  stupid,  rural  look  about  it,  and  one  can 
hardly  bring  himself  to  believe  that  a  busy,  substantially  built 
city  once  existed  here,  even  two  thousand  years  ago.  The 
place  was  nevertheless  the  scene  of  an  event  whose  effects 
have  added  page  after  page  and  volume  after  volume  to  the 
world's  history.  For  in  this  place  Christ  stood  when  He  said 
to  Peter : 

Thou  art  Peter;  and  upon  this  rock  wilt  I  build  my  church,  and 
the  gates  of  hell  shall  not  prevail  against  it.  And  I  will  give  unto 
thee  the  keys  of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven;  and  whatsoever  thou  shalt 
bind  on  earth  shall  be  bound  in  heaven,  and  whatsoever  thou  shalt 
loose  on  earth  shall  be  loosed  in  heaven. 

On  these  little  sentences  have  been  built  up  the  mighty  edi 
fice  of  the  Church  of  Rome;  in  them  lie  the  authority  for  the 
imperial  power  of  the  Popes  over  temporal  affairs,  and  their 
godlike  power  to  curse  a  soul  or  wash  it  white  from  sin.  To 
sustain  the  position  of  "the  only  true  Church,"  which  Rome 
claims  was  thus  conferred  upon  her,  she  has  fought  and  lab 
ored  and  struggled  for  many  a  century,  and  will  continue  to 
keep  herself  busy  in  the  same  work  to  the  end  of  time.  The 
memorable  words  I  have  quoted  give  to  this  ruined  city  about 


334  MARK  TWAIN 

allthe  interest  it  possesses  to  people  of  the  present  day. 

(it  seems  curious  enough  to  us  to  be   standing  on  ground 

that  was  once  actually  pressed  by  the   feet  of   the    Saviour. 

The  situation  is  suggestive  of  a  reality  and  a  tangibility  that 

^geem  at  variance  with  the  vagueness  and  mystery  and  ghost- 

liness  that  one  naturally  attaches  to  the  character  of  a  god.     I 

|!cannot  comprehend  yet  that   I   am   sitting  where  a  god  has 

'stood,  and  looking  upon  the  brook  and  the  mountains  which 

mhat  god  looked  upon,  and  am  surrounded  by  dusky  men  and 

i.  *  women  whose  ancestors  saw  him,  and  even  talked  with  him, 

I  face  to   face,  and  carelessly,   just  as  they  would  have  done 

:  with  any  other  stranger.    I  cannot  comprehend  this ;  the  gods 

'of  my  understanding  have  been  always  hidden  in  clouds  and 

*  very  far  away.'t 

This  morning,  during  breakfast,  the  usual  assemblage  of 
squalid  humanity  sat  patiently  without  the  charmed  circle  of 
the  camp  and  waited  for  such  crumbs  as  pity  might  bestow 
upon  their  misery.  There  were  old  and  young,  brown-skinned 
and  yellow.  Some  of  the  men  were  tall  and  stalwart  (for 
one  hardly  sees  anywhere  such  splendid-looking  men  as  here 
in  the  East),  but  all  the  women  and  children  looked  worn 
and  sad,  and  distressed  with  hunger.  They  reminded  me 
much  of  Indians,  did  these  people.  They  had  but  little  cloth 
ing,  but  such  as  they  had  was  fanciful  in  character  and  fan 
tastic  in  its  arrangement.  Any  little  absurd  gewgaw  or  gim- 
crack  they  had  they  disposed  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  it 
attract  attention  most  readily.  They  sat  in  silence,  and  with 
tireless  patience  watched  our  every  motion  with  that  vile,  un 
complaining  impoliteness  which  is  so  truly  Indian,  and  which 
makes  a  white  man  so  nervous  and  uncomfortable  and  savage 
that  he  wants  to  exterminate  the  whole  tribe. 

These  people  about  us  had  other  peculiarities,  which  I  have 
noticed  in  the  noble  red  man,  too :  they  were  infested  with 
vermin,  and  the  dirt  had  caked  on  them  till  it  amounted  to 
bark. 

The  little  children  were  in  a  pitiable  condition — they  all  had 
sore  eyes,  and  were  otherwise  afflicted  in  various  ways.  They 
say  that  hardly  a  native  child  in  all  the  East  is  free  from  sore 
eyes,  and  that  thousands  of  them  go  blind  of  one  eye  or  both 
every  year.  I  think  this  must  be  so,  for  I  see  plenty  of  blind 
people  every  day,  and  I  do  not  remember  seeing  any  children 
that  hadn't  sore  eyes.  And,  would  you  suppose  that  an  Amer 
ican  mother  could  sit  for  an  hour,  with  her  child  in  her  arms, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  335 

and  let  a  hundred  flies  roost  upon  its  eyes  all  that  time  un 
disturbed?  I  see  that  every  day.  It  makes  my  flesh  creep. 
Yesterday  we  met  a  woman  riding  on  a  little  jackass,  and  she 
had  a  little  child  in  her  arms;  honestly,  I  thought  the  child 
had  goggles  on  as  we  approached,  and  I  wondered  how  its 
mother  could  afford  so  much  style.  But  when  we  drew  near, 
we  saw  that  the  goggles  were  nothing  but  a  camp-meeting  of 
flies  assembled  around  each  of  the  child's  eyes,  and  at  the  same 
time  there  was  a  detachment  prospecting  its  nose.  The  flies 
were  happy,  the  child  was  contented,  and  so  the  mother  did 
not  interfere. 

As  soon  as  the  tribe  found  out  that  we  had  a  doctor  in  our 
party,  they  began  to  flock  in  from  all  quarters.  Dr.  B.,  in  the 
charity  of  his  nature,  had  taken  a  child  from  a  woman  who 
sat  near  by,  and  put  some  sort  of  a  wash  upon  its  diseased 
eyes.  That  woman  went  ofT  and  started  a  whole  nation,  and 
it  was  a  sight  to  see  them  swarm !  The  lame,  the  halt,  the 
blind,  the  leprous — all  the  distempers  that  are  bred  of  in 
dolence,  dirt,  and  iniquity — were  represented  in  the  congress  in 
ten  minutes,  and  still  they  came !  Every  woman  that  had  a 
sick  baby  brought  it  along,  and  every  woman  that  hadn't,  bor 
rowed  one.  What  reverent  and  what  worshiping  looks  they 
bent  upon  that  dread,  mysterious  power,  the  Doctor!  They 
watched  him  take  his  vials  out;  they  watched  him  measure 
the  particles  of  white  powder ;  they  watched  him  add  drops 
of  one  precious  liquid,  and  drops  of  another ;  they  lost  not 
the  slightest  movement ;  their  eyes  were  riveted  upon  him  with 
a  fascination  that  nothing  could  distract.  I  believe  they 
thought  he  was  gifted  like  a  god.  When  each  individual  got 
his  portion  of  medicine,  his  eyes  were  radiant  with  joy — not 
withstanding  by  nature  they  are  a  thankless  and  impassive 
race — and  upon  his  face  was  written  the  unquestioning  faith 
that  nothing  on  earth  could  prevent  the  patient  from  getting 
well  now. 

Christ  knew  how  to  preach  to  these  simple,  superstitious, 
disease-tortured  creatures:  He  healed  the  sick.  They  flocked 
to  our  poor  human  doctor  this  morning  when  the  fame  of 
what  he  had  done  to  the  sick  child  went  abroad  in  the  land, 
and  they  worshiped  him  with  their  eyes  while  they  did  not 
know  as  yet  whether  there  was  virtue  in  his  simples  or  not. 
The  ancestors  of  these — people  precisely  like  them  in  color, 
dress,  manners,  customs,  simplicity — flocked  in  vast  multi- 


336  MARK  TWAIN 

tudes  after  Christ,  and  when  they  saw  Him  make  the  afflicted 
whole  with  a  word,  it  is  no  wonder  they  worshiped  Him.  No 
wonder  His  deeds  were  the  talk  of  the  nation.  No  wonder  the 
multitude  that  followed  Him  was  so  great  that  at  one  time- 
thirty  miles  from  here — they  had  to  let  a  sick  man  down 
through  the  roof  because  no  approach  could  be  made  to  the 
door;  no  wonder  His  audiences  were  so  great  at  Galilee  thai- 
He  had  to  preach  from  a  ship  removed  a  little  distance  from 
the  shore;  no  wonder  that  even  in  the  desert  places  about 
Bethsaida,  five  thousand  invaded  His  solitude,  and  He  had  to 
feed  them  by  a  miracle  or  else  see  them  suffer  for  their  con 
fiding  faith  and  devotion;  no  wonder  when  there  was  a  great 
commotion  in  a  city  in  those  days,  one  neighbor  explained  it 
to  another  in  words  to  this  effect:  "They  say  that  Jesus  of 
Nazareth  is  come !" 

Well,  as  I  was  saying,  the  doctor  distributed  medicine  as 
long  as  he  had  to  distribute,  and  his  reputation  is  mighty 
in  Galilee  this  day.  Among  his  patients  was  the  child  of  the 
Sheik's  daughter — for  even  this  poor,  ragged  handful  of  sores 
and  sin  has  its  royal  Sheik — a  poor  old  mummy  that  looked 
as  if  he  would  be  more  at  home  in  a  poorhouse  than  in  the 
Chief  Magistracy  of  this  tribe  of  hopeless,  shirtless  savages. 
The  princess — I  mean  the  Sheik's  daughter- — was  only  thirteen 
or  fourteen  years  old,  and  had  a  very  sweet  face  and  a  prettty 
one.  She  was  the  only  Syrian  female  we  have  seen  yet  who 
was  not  so  sinfully  ugly  that  she  couldn't  smile  after  ten 
o'clock  Saturday  night  without  breaking  the  Sabbath.  Her 
child  was  a  hard  specimen,  though — there  wasn't  enough  of 
it  to  make  a  pie,  and  the  poor  little  thing  looked  so  pleadingly 
up  at  all  who  came  near  it  (as  if  it  had  an  idea  that  now  was 
its  chance  or  never)  that  we  were  filled  with  compassion  which1 
was  genuine  and  not  put  on. 

But  this  last  new  horse  I  have  got  is  trying  to  break  his 
neck  over  the  tent-ropes,  and  I  shall  have  to  go  out  and  anchor 
him.  Jericho  and  I  have  parted  company.  The  new  horse 
is  not  much  to  boast  of,  I  think.  One  of  his  hind  legs  bends 
the  wrong  way,  and  the  other  one  is  as  straight  and  stiff  as  a 
tent-pole.  Most  of  his  teeth  are  gone,  and  he  is  blind  as  a 
bat.  His  nose  has  been  broken  at  some  time  or  other,  and  is 
arched  like  a  culvert  now'.  His  under-lip  hangs  down  like  a 
camel's,  and  his  ears  are  chopped  off  close  to  his  head.  I  had 
some  trouble  at  first  to  find  a  name  for  him,  but  I  finally  con- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  337 

eluded  to  call  him  Baalbec,  because  he  is  such  a  magnificent 
ruin.  I  cannot  keep  from  talking  about  my  horses,  because 
I  have  a  very  long  and  tedious  journey  before  me,  and  they 
naturally  occupy  my  thoughts  about  as  much  as  matters  of  ap 
parently  much  greater  importance. 

We  satified  our  pilgrims  by  making  those  hard  rides  from 
Baalbec  to  Damascus,  but  Dan's  horse  and  Jack's  were  so 
crippled  we  had  to  leave  them  behind  and  get  fresh  animals 
for  them.  The  dragoman  says  Jack's  horse  died.  I  swapped 
horses  with  Mohammed,  the  kingly-looking  Egyptian  who  is 
our  Ferguson's  lieutenant.  By  Ferguson  I  mean  our  drago 
man  Abraham,  of  course.  I  did  not  take  this  horse  on  account 
of  his  personal  appearance,  but  because  I  have  not  seen  his 
back.  I  do  not  wish  to  see  it.  I  have  seen  the  backs  of  all 
the  other  horses,  and  found  most  of  them  covered  with  dread 
ful  saddle-boils  which  I  know  have  not  been  washed  or  doc 
tored  for  years.  The  idea  of  riding  all  day  long  over  such 
ghastly  inquisitions  of  torture  is  sickening.  My  horse  must 
be  like  the  others,  but  I  have  at  least  the  consolation  of  not 
knowing  it  to  be  so. 

I  hope,  that  in  future  I  may  be  spared  any  more  sentimental 
praises  of  the  Arab's  idolatry  of  his  horse.  In  boyhood  I 
longed  to  be  an  Arab  of  the  desert  and  have  a  beautiful  mare, 
and  call  her  Selim  or  Benjamin  or  Mohammed,  and  feed  her 
with  my  own  hands,  and  let  her  come  into  the  tent,  and  teach 
her  to  caress  me  and  look  fondly  upon  me  with  her  great 
tender  eyes;  and  I  wished  that  a  stranger  might  come  at  such 
a  time  and  offer  me  a  hundred  thousand  dollars  for  her,  so 
that  I  could  do  like  the  other  Arabs — hesitate,  yearn  for  the 
money,  but,  overcome  by  my  love  for  my  mare,  at  last  say, 
"Part  with  thee,  my  beautiful  one!  Never  with  my  life! 
Away,  tempter,  I  scorn  thy  gold !"  and  then  bound  into  the 
saddle  and  speed  over  the  desert  like  the  wind! 

But  I  recall  those  aspirations.  If  these  Arabs  be  like  the 
other  Arabs,  their  love  for  their  beautiful  mares  is  a  fraud. 
These  of  my  acquaintance  have  no  love  for  their  horses,  no 
sentiment  of  pity  for  them,  and  no  knowledge  of  how  to 
treat  them  or  care  for  them.  The  Syrian  saddle-blanket  is  a 
quilted  mattress  two  or  three  inches  thick.  It  is  never  re 
moved  from  the  horse,  day  or  night.  It  gets  full  of  dirt  and 
hair,  and  becomes  soaked  with  sweat.  It  is  bound  to  breed 
sores.  These  pirates  never  think  of  washing  a  horse's  back 


338  INNOCENTS  ABROAD 

They  do  not  shelter  the  horses  in  the  tents,  either;  they  must 
stay  out  and  take  the  weather  as  it  comes.  Look  at  poor 
cropped  and  dilapidated  Baalbec,  and  weep  for  the  sentiment 
that  has  been  wasted  upon  the  Selims  of  romance. 


CHAPTER  XLVI 

A~)OUT  an  hour's   ride  over   a   rough,   rocky  road,  half 
flooded   with   water,   and  through  a   forest   of   oaks   of 
Bashan,  brought  us  to   Dan. 

From  a  little  mound  here  in  the  plain  issues  a  broad  stream 
of  limpid  water  and  forms  a  large  shallow  pool,  and  then 
rushes  furiously  onward,  augmented  in  volume.  This  puddle 
is  an  important  source  of  the  Jordan.  Its  banks,  and  those 
of  the  brook,  are  respectably  adorned  with  blooming  oleanders, 
lj?ut  the  unutterable  beauty  of  the  spot  will  not  throw  a  well- 
balanced  man  into  convulsions,  as  the  Syrian  books  of  travel 
would  lead  one  to  suppose. 

From  the  spot  I  am  speaking  of,  a  cannon-ball  would  carry 
beyond  the  confines  of  Holy  Land  and  light  upon  profane 
ground  three  miles  away.  We  were  only  one  little  hour's 
travel  within  the  borders  of  Holy  Land — we  had  hardly  begun 
to  appreciate  yet  that  we  were  standing  upon  any  different  sort 
of  earth  than  that  we  had  always  been  used  to,  and  yet  see  how 
the  historic  names  began  already  to  cluster!  Dan — Bashan — 
Lake  Huleh — the  Sources  of  Jordan — the  Sea  of  Galilee. 
They  were  all  in  sight  but  the  last,  and  it  was  not  far  away. 
The  little  township  of  Bashan  was  once  the  kingdom  so  famous 
in  Scripture  for  its  bulls  and  its  oaks.  Lake  Huleh  is  the 
Biblical  "Waters  of  Merom."  /Ban  was  the  northern  and  *  . 
Beersheba  the  sourthern  limit  of*  Palestine — hence  the  ex 
pression  "from  Dan  to  Beersheba."  It  is  equivalent  to 
our  phrases  "from  Maine  to  Texas" — "from  Baltimore  to  San 
Francisco."  Our  expression  and  that  of  the  Israelites  both 
mean  the  same — great  distance.  With  their  slow  camels  and 
asses,  it  was  about  a  seven  days'  journey  from  Dan  to  Beer 
sheba — say  a  hundred  and  fifty  or  sixty  miles — it  was  the  entire 
length  of  their  country,  and  was  not  to  be  undertaken  without 
great  preparation  and  much  ceremony.  When  the  prodigal 
traveled  to  "a  far  country,"  it  is  not  likely  that  he  went  more 
than  eighty  or  ninety  miles.  Palestine  is  only  from  forty  to 
sixty  miles  wide.  The  state  of  Missouri  could  be  split  into  three 
Palestines,  and  there  would  then  be  enough  material  left  for 

339 


340  MARK  TWAIN 

'part  of  another— possibly  a  whole  one.  From  Baltimore  to 
San  Francisco  is  several  thousand  miles,  but  it  will  be  only  a 
seven  days'  journey  in  the  cars  when  I  am  two  or  three  years 
1  older?)  If  I  live  I  shall  necessarily  have  to  go  across  the  con- 
tmerrtevery  now  and  then  in  those  cars,  but  one  journey  from 
Dan  to  Beersheba  will  be  sufficient,  no  doubt.  It  must  be  the 
most  trying  of  the  two.  Therefore,  if  we  chance  to  discover 
that  from  Dan  to  Beersheba  seemed  a  mighty  stretch  of  country 
to  the  Israelites,  let  us  not  be  airy  with  them,  but  reflect  that  it 
was  and  is  a  mighty  stretch  when  one  cannot  traverse  it  by  rail. 

The  small  mound  I  have  mentioned  a  while  ago  was  once 
occupied  by  the  Phoenician  city  of  Laish.  A  party  of  filibusters 
from  Zorah  and  Eshcol  captured  the  place,  and  lived  there  in  a 
free  and  easy  way,  worshiping  gods  of  their  own  manufacture 
and  stealing  idols  from  their  neighbors  whenever  they  wore 
their  own  out.  Jeroboam  set  up  a  golden  calf  here  to  fascinate 
his  people  and  keep  them  from  making  dangerous  trips  to 
Jerusalem  to  worship,  which  might  result  in  a  return  to  their 
rightful  allegiance.  With  respect  for  those  ancient  Israel 
ites,  I  cannot  overlook  the  fact  that  they  were  not  always  vir 
tuous  enough  to  withstand  the  seductions  of  a  golden  calf. 
Human  nature  has  not  changed  much  since  then. 

Some  forty  centuries  ago  the  city  of  Sodom  was  pillaged  by 
the  Arab  princes  of  Mesopotamia,  and  among  other  prisoners 
they  seized  upon  the  patriarch  Lot  and  brought  him  here  on 
their  way  to  their  own  possessions.  They  brought  him  to  Dan, 
and  father  Abraham,  who  was  pursuing  them,  crept  softly  in 
at  dead  of  night,  among  the  whispering  oleanders  and  under 
the  shadows  of  the  stately  oaks,  and  fell  upon  the  slumbering 
victors  and  startled  them' from  their  dreams  with  the  clash  oft 
steel.  He  recaptured  Lot  and  all  the  other  plunder. 

We  moved  on.  We  were  now  in  a  green  valley,  fivev  or  six 
miles  wide  and  fifteen  long.  The  streams  which  are  called 
the  sources  of  the  Jordan  flow  through  it  to  Lake  Huleh,  a 
shallow  pond  three  miles  in  diameter,  and  from  the  southern 
extremity  of  the  lake  the  concentrated  Jordan  flows  out.  The 
lake  is  surrounded  by  a  broad  marsh,  grown  with  reeds.  Be 
tween  the  marsh  and  the  mountains  which  wall  the  valley  is  a 
respectable  strip  of  fertile  land ;  at  the  end  of  the  valley,  toward 
Dan,  as  much  as  half  the  land  is  solid  and  fertile,  and  watered 
by  Jordan's  sources.  There  is  enough  of  it  to  make  a  farm. 
tt  almost  warrants  the  enthusiasm  of  the  spies  of  that  rabble 

aThe  railroad  has  been  completed  since  the  above  was  written. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  341 

o£  adventurers  who  captured  Dan.  They  said:  "We  have 
seen  the  land,  and  behold  it  is  very  good.  ...  A  place  where 
there  is  no  want  of  anything  that  is  in  the  earth." 

Their  enthusiasm  was  at  least  warranted  by  the  fact  that 
they  had  never  seen  a  country  as  good  as  this.  There  was 
enough  of  it  for  the  ample  support  of  their  six  hundred  men 
and  their  families,  too. 

When  we  got  fairly  down  on  the  level  part  of  the  Danite 
farm,  we  came  to  places  where  we  could  actually  run  our 
horses.  It  was  a  notable  circumstance. 

We  had  been  painfully  clambering  over  interminable  hills 
and  rocks  for  days  together,  and  when  we  suddenly  came  upon 
this  astonishing  piece  of  rockless  plain,  every  man  drove  the 
spurs  into  his  horse  and  sped  away  with  a  velocity  he  could 
surely  enjoy  to  the  utmost,  but  could  never  hope  to  comprehend 
in  Syria. 

Here  were  evidences  of  cultivation — a  rare  sight  in  this 
country — an  acre  or  two  of  rich  soil  studded  with  last  year's 
dead  corn-stalks  of  the  thickness  of  your  thumb  and  very  wide 
apart.  But  in  such  a  land  it  was  a  thrilling  spectacle.  Close 
to  it  was  a  stream,  and  on  its  banks  a  great  herd  of  curious- 
looking  Syrian  goats  and  sheep  were  gratefully  eating  gravel. 
I  do  not  state  this  as  a  petrified  fact — I  only  suppose  they  were 
eating  gravel,  because  there  did  not  appear  to  be  anything  else 
for  them  to  eat.  The  shepherds  that  tended  them  were  the 
very  pictures  of  Joseph  and  his  brethern,  I  have  no  doubt  in 
the  world.  They  were  tall,  muscular,  and  very  dark-skinned 
Bedouins,  with  inky  black  beards.  They  had  firm  lips,  un- 
quailing  eyes,  and  a  kingly  stateliness  of  bearing.  They  wore 
the  parti-colored  half  bonnet,  half  hood,  with  fringed  ends 
falling  upon  their  shoulders,  and  the  full,  flowing  robe  barred 
with  broad  black  stripes — the  dress  one  sees  in  all  pictures  of 
the  swarthy  sons  of  the  desert.  These  chaps  would  sell  their 
younger  brothers  if  they  had  a  chance,  I  think.  They  have 
the  manners,  the  customs,  the  dress,  the  occupation,  and  the 
loose  principles  of  the  ancient  stock.  [They  attacked  our  camp 
last  night,  and  I  bear  them  no  good  will.]  They  had  with  them 
the  pygmy  jackasses  one  sees  all  over  Syria  and  remembers  in 
all  pictures 'of  the  "Flight  into  Egypt,"  where  Mary  and  the 
Young  Child  are  riding  and  Joseph  is  walking  alongside,  tower 
ing  high  above  the  little  donkey's  shoulders. 

But,  really,  here  the  man  rides  and  carries  the  child,  as  a 
general  thing,  and  the  woman  walks.  The  customs  have  not 


342  MARK  TWAIN 

changed  since  Joseph's  time.  We  would  not  have  in  our  houses 
a  picture  representing  Joseph  riding  and  Mary  walking;  we 
would  see  profanation  in  it,  but  a  Syrian  Christian  would  not. 
I  know  that  hereafter  the  picture  I  first  spoke  of  will  look  odd 
to  me. 

We  could  not  stop  to  rest  two  or  three  hours  out  from  our 
camp,  of  course,  albeit  the  brook  was  beside  us.  So  we  went 
on  an  hour  longer.  We  saw  water  then,  but  nowhere  in  all  the 
waste  around  was  there  a  foot  of  shade,  and  we  were  scorching 
to  death.  "Like  unto  the  shadow  of  a  great  rock  in  a  weary 
land."  Nothing  in  the  Bible  is  more  beautiful  thaii  that,  and 
surely  there  is  no  place  we  have  wandered  to  that  is  able  to 
give  it  such  touching  expression  as  this  blistering,  naked,  tree 
less  land. 

Here  you  do  not  stop  just  when  you  please,  but  when  3-011 
can.  We  found  water,  but  no  shade.  We  traveled  on  and 
found  a  tree  at  last,  but  no  water.  We  rested  and  lunched, 
and  came  on  to  this  place,  Ain  Mellahah  (the  boys  call  it 
Baldwinsville).  It  was  a  very  short  day's  run.  but  the  drago 
man  does  not  want  to  go  further,  and  has  invented  a  plausible 
lie  about  the  country  beyond  this  being  infested  by  ferocious 
Arabs,  who  would  make  sleeping  in  their  midst  a  dangerous 
pastime.  Well,  they  ought  to  be  dangerous.  They  carry  a 
rusty  old  weather-beaten  flintlock  gun,  with  a  barrel  that  is 
longer  than  themselves ;  it  has  no  sights  on  it ;  it  will  not  carry 
farther  than  a  brickbat,  and  is  not  half  so  certain.  And  the 
great  sash  they  wear  in  many  a  fold  around  their  waists  has 
two  or  three  absurd  old  horse-pistols  in  it  that  are  rusty  from 
eternal  disuse — weapons  that  would  hang  fire  just  about  long 
enough  for  you  to  walk  out  of  range,  and  then  burst  and  blow 
the  Arab's  head  off.  Exceedingly  dangerous  these  sons  of  thei 
desert  are. 

It  used  to  make  my  blood  run  cold  to  read  Wm.  C.  GHmes's 
hairbreadth  escapes  from  Bedouins,  but  I  think  I  could  read 
them  now  without  a  tremor.  He  never  said  he  was  attacked 
by  Bedouins,  I  believe,  or  was  ever  treated  uncivilly,  but  then 
in  about  every  other  chapter  he  discovered  them  approaching, 
anyhow,  and  he  had  a  blood-curdling  fashion  of  working  up 
the  peril ;  and  of  wondering  how  his  relations  far  away  would 
feel  could  ^they  see  their  poor  wandering  boy,  with  his  weary 
feet  and  his  dim  eyes,  in  such  fearful  danger ;  and  of  thinking 
for  the  last  time  of  the  old  homestead,  and'the  clear  old  church, 
and  the  cow,  and  those  things ;  and  of  finally  straightening  his 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  343 

form  to  its  utmost  height  in  the  saddle,  drawing  his  trusty  re 
volver,  and  then  dashing  the  spurs  into  "Mohammed"  and 
sweeping  down  upon  the  ferocious  enemy  determined  to  sell 
his  life  as  dearly  as  possible.  True,  the  Bedouins  never  did 
anything  to  him  when  he  arrived,  and  never  had  any  intention 
of  doing  anything  to  him  in  the  first  place,  and  wondered  what 
in  the  mischief  he  was  making  all  that  to-do  about ;  but  still 
I  could  not  divest  myself  of  the  idea,  somehow,  that  a  frightful 
peril  had  been  escaped  throught  that  man's  daredevil  bravery, 
and  so  I  never  could  read  about  Wm.  C.  Grimes's  Bedouins 
and  sleep  comfortably  afterward.  But  I  believe  the  Bedouins 
to  be  a  fraud,  now.  I  have  seen  the  monster,  and  I  can  outrun 
him.  I  shall  never  be  afraid  of  his  daring  to  stand  behind  his 
own  gun  and  discharge  it. 

About  fifteen  hundred  years  before  Christ,  this  camp-ground 
of  ours  by  the  Waters  of  Merom  was  the  scene  of  one  of 
Joshua's  exterminating  battles.  Jabin,  King  of  Hazor  (up 
yonder  above  Dan),  called  all  the  sheiks  about  him  together, 
with  their  hosts,  to  make  ready  for  Israel's  terrible  General 
who  was  approaching. 

And  when  all  these  Kings  were  met  together,  they  came  and  pitched 
together  by  the  Waters  of  Merorn,  to  fight  against  Israel. 

And  they  went  out,  they  and  all  their  hosts  with  them,  much  people, 
even  as  the  sand  that  is  upon  the  seashore  for  multitude  [etc.]. 

But  Joshua  fell  upon  them  and  utterly  destroyed  them,  root 
and  branch.  That  was  his  usual  policy  in  war.  He  never  left 
any  chance  for  newspaper  controversies  about  who  won  the 
battle.  He  made  this  valley,  so  quiet  now,  a  reeking  slaughter- 
pen. 

Somewhere  in  this  part  of  the  country — I  do  not  know  ex 
actly  where — Israel  fought  another  bloody  battle  a  hundred 
years  later.  Deborah,  the  prophetess,  told  Barak  to  take  ten 
thousand  men  and  sally  forth  against  another  King  Jabin  who 
had  been  doing  something.  Barak  came  down  from  Mount 
Tabor,  twenty  or  twenty-five  miles  from  here,  and  gave  battle 
to  Jabin's  forces,  who  were  in  command  of  Sisera.  Barak 
won  the  fight,  and  while  he  was  making  the  victory  complete 
by  the  usual  method  of  exterminating  the  remnant  of  the  de 
feated  host,  Sisera  fled  away  on  foot,  and  when  he  was  nearly 
exhausted  by  fatigue  and  thirst,  one  Jael,  a  woman  he  seems 
to  have  been  acquainted  with,  invited  him  to  come  into  her 


344  MARK  TWAIN 

tent  and  rest  himself.  The  weary  soldier  acceded  readily 
enough,  and  Jael  put  him  to  bed.  He  said  he  was  thirsty,  and 
asked  his  generous  preserver  to  get  him  get  him  a  cup  of  water. 
She  brought  him  some  milk,  and  he  drank  of  it  gratefully  and 
lay  down  again,  to  forget  in  pleasant  dreams  his  lost  battle  and 
his  humbled  pride.  Presently  when  he  was  asleep  she  came 
softly  in  with  a  hammer  and  drove  a  hideous  tent-pin  down 
through  his  brain ! 

"For  he  was  fast  asleep  and  weary.  So  he  died."  Such 
is  the  touching  language  of  the  Bible.  "The  Song  of  Deborah 
and  Barak"  praises  Jael  for  the  memorable  service  she  had 
rendered,  in  an  exultant  strain : 

Blessed  above  women  shall  Jael  the  wife  of  Keber  the  Kenite  be, 
blessed  shall  she  be  above  women  in  the  tent. 

He  asked  for  water,  and  she  gave  him  milk;  she  brought  forth 
butter  in  a  lordly  dish. 

She  put  her  hand  to  the  nail,  and  her  right  hand  to  the  workman's 
hammer;  and  with  the  hammer  she  smote  Sisera,  she  smote  off  his 
head  when  she  had  pierced  and  stricken  through  his  temples. 

At  her  feet  he  bowed,  he  fell,  he  lay  down;  at  her  feet  he  bowed, 
he  fell;  where  he  bowed,  there  he  fell  down  dead. 

Stirring  scenes  like  these  occur  in  this  valley  no  more.  There- 
is  not  a  solitary  village  throughout  its  whole  extent — not  for 
thirty  miles  in  either  direction.  There  are  two  or  three  small 
clusters  of  Bedouins  tents,  but  not  a  single  permanent  habita 
tion.  One  may  ride  ten  miles,  hereabouts,  and  not  see  ten 
human  beings. 

To  this  region  one  of  the  prophecies  is  applied: 

I  will  bring  the  land  into  desolation ;  and  your  enemies  which  dwell 
therein  shall  be  astonished  at  it.  And  I  will  scatter  you  among  the*, 
heathen,  and  I  will  draw  out  a  sword  after  you;  and  your  land  shall- 
be  desolate  and  your  cities  waste. 

No  man  can  stand  here  by  deserted  Am  Mellahah  and  say 
the  prophecy  has  not  been  fulfilled. 

In  a  verse  from  the  Bible  which  I  have  quoted  above,  occurs 
the  phrase  "all  these  kings."  It  attracted  my  attention  in  a 
moment,  because  it  carries  to  my  mind  such  a  vastly  different 
significance  from  what  it  always  did  at  home.  I  can  see  easily 
enough  that  if  I  wish  to  profit  by  this  tour  and  come  to  a 
correct  understanding  of'  the  matters  of  interest  connected 
with  it,  I  must  studiously  and  faithfully  unlearn  a  great  many 
things  I  have  somehow  absorbed  concerning  Palestine.  I  must 


MARK  TWAIN  345 

begin  a  system  of  reduction.  Like  my  grapes  which  the  spies 
bore  out  of  the  Promised  Land,  I  have  got  everything  in 
Palestine  on  too  large  a  scale.  Some  of  my  ideas  were  wild 
enough.  The  word  Palestine  always  brought  to  my  mind  a 
vague  suggestion  of  a  country  as  large  as  the  United  States. 
I  do  not  know  why,  but  such  was  the  case.  I  suppose  it  was 
because  I  could  not  conceive  of  a  small  country  having  so  large 
a  history.  I  think  I  was  a  little  surprised  to  find  that  the  grand 
Sultan  of  Turkey  was  a  man  of  only  ordinary  size.  I  must  try 
to  reduce  my  ideas  of  Palestine  to  a  more  reasonable  shape. 
One  gets  large  impressions  in  boyhood,  sometimes,  which  he 
lias  to  fight  against  all  his  life.  "All  these  kings."  When  I 
used  to  read  that  in  Sunday-school,  it  suggested  to  me  the 
several  kings  of  such  countries  as  England,  France,  Spain, 
Germany,  Russia,  etc.,  arrayed  in  splendid  robes  ablaze  with 
jewels,  marching  in  grave  procession,  with  scepters  of  gold 
in  their  hands  and  flashing  crowns  upon  their  heads.  But 
here  in  Ain  Mellahah,  after  coming  through  Syria,  and  after 
giving  serious  study  to  the  character  and  customs  of  the  coun 
try,  the  phrase  "all  these  kings"  loses  its  grandeur.  It  suggests 
only  a  parcel  of  petty  chiefs — ill-clad  and  ill-conditioned  sav 
ages  much  like  our  Indians,  who  lived  in  full  sight  of  each  other 
and  whose  "kingdoms"  were  large  when  they  were  five  miles 
square  and  contained  two  thousand  souls.  The  combined  mon 
archies  of  the  thirty  "kings"  destroyed  by  Joshua  on  one  of  his 
famous  campaigns,  only  covered  an  area  about  equal  to  four 
of  our  counties  of  ordinary  size.  The  poor  old  sheik  we  saw 
at  Ceasarea  Philippi,  with  his  ragged  band  of  a  hundred  fol 
lowers,  would  have  been  called  a  "king"  in  those  ancient  times. 
It  is  seven  in  the  morning,  and  as  we  are  in  the  country,  the 
grass  ought  to  be  sparkling  with  dew,  the  flowers  enriching  the 
air  with  their  fragrance,  and  the  birds  singing  in  the  trees. 
But,  alas !  there  is  no  dew  here,  nor  flowers,  nor  birds,  nor 
trees.  There  is  a  plain  and  an  unshaded  lake,  and  beyond 
them  some  barren  mountains.  The  tents  are  tumbling,  the 
Arabs  are  quarreling  like  dogs  and  cats,  as  usual,  the  camp 
ground  is  strewn  with  packages  and  bundles,  the  labor  of  pack 
ing  them  upon  the  backs  of  the  mules  is  progressing  with 
great  activity,  the  horses  are  saddled,  the  umbrellas  are  out, 
and  in  ten  minutes  we  shall  mount  and  the  long  procession 
will  move  again.  The  white  city  of  the  Mellahah,  resurrected 
for  a  moment  out  of  the  dead  centuries,  will  have  disappeared 
again  and  left  no  sign. 


CHAPTER  XLVII 

WE  traversed  some  miles  of  desolate  country  whose  soil 
is  rich  enough,  but  is  given  over  wholly  to  weeds — a 
silent,  mournful  expanse,  wherein  we  saw  only  three 
persons — Arabs,  with  nothing  on  but  a  long  coarse  shirt  like 
the  "tow-linen"  shirts  which  used  to  form  the  only  summer 
garment  of  little  negro  boys  on  Southern  plantations.     Shep 
herds  they  were,  and  they  charmed  their  flocks  with  the  tradi 
tional  shepherd's  pipe — a  reed  instrument  that  made  music  as 
exquisitely  infernal  as  these  same  Arabs  create  when  they  sing. 
In  their  pipes  lingered  no  echo  of  the  wonderful  music  the 
shepherd  forefathers  heard  in  the  Plains  of   Bethlehem  that 
time  the  angels  sang  "Peace  on  earth,  good  will  to  men." 

Part  of  the  ground  we  came  over  was  not  ground  at  all, 
but  rocks— cream-colored  rocks,  worn  smooth,  as  if  by  water; 
with  seldom  an  edge  or  a  corner  on  them,  but  scooped  out, 
honeycombed,  bored  out  with  eye-holes,  and  thus  wrought  into 
all  manner  of  quaint  shapes,  among  which  the  uncouth  imita 
tion  of  skulls  was  frequent.  Over  this  part  of  the  route  were 
occasional  remains  of  an  old  Roman  road  like  the  Appian  Way, 
whose  paving-stones  still  clung  to  their  places  with  Roman 
tenacity. 

^  Gray  lizards,  those  heirs  of  ruin,  of  sepulchers  and  desola 
tion,  glided  in  and  out  among  the  rocks  or  lay  still  and  sunned 
t> themselves.    Inhere  prosperity  has  reigned,  and  fallen;  where* 
'  1  glory  has  flamed,  and  gone  out;  where  beauty  has  dwelt,  ane{ 
}  passed  away ;  where  gladness  was,  and  sorrow  is ;  where  the 
I  pomp  of  life  has  been,  and  silence  and  death  brood  in  its  high 
;:  places,  there  this  reptile  makes  his  home,  and  mocks  at  human 
'  vanity?)  His  coat  is  the  color  of  ashes ;  and  ashes  are  the  sym 
bol  of  hopes  that  have  perished,  of  aspirations  that  came  to 
naught,  of  loves  that  are  buried,  fit  he  could  speak,  he  would 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  347 

A  few  ants  were  in  this  desert  place,  but  merely  to  spend  the 
summer.  They  brought  their  provisions  from  Ain  Mellahah — 
eleven  miles. 

Jack  is  not  very  well  to-day,  it  is  easy  to  see ;  but,  boy  as  he 
is,  he  is  too  much  of  a  man  to  speak  of  it.  He  exposed  himself 
to  the  sun  too  much  yesterday,  but  since  it  came  of  his  earnest 
desire  to  learn,  and  to  make  this  journey  as  useful  as  the  op 
portunities  will  allow,  no  one  seeks  to  discourage  him  by  fault 
finding.  We  missed  him  an  hour  from  the  camp,  and  then 
found  him  some  distance  away,  by  the  edge  of  a  brook,  and 
with  no  umbrella  to  protect  him  from  the  fierce  sun.  If  he  had 
been  used  to  going  without  his  umbrella,  it  would  have  been 
well  enough,  of  course ;  but  he  was  not.  He  was  just  in  the 
act  of  throwing  a  clod  at  a  mud-turtle  which  was  sunning  itself 
j  on  a  small  log  in  the  brook.  We  said : 

"Don't  do  that,  Jack.  W7hat  do  you  want  to  harm  him 
for  ?  What  has  he  done  ?" 

"Well,  then,  I  won't  kill  him,  but  I  ought  to,  because  he 
is  a  fraud/' 

We  asked  him  why,  but  he  said  it  was  no  matter.    We  asked 

him  why,  once  or  twice,  as  we  walked  back  to  the  camp,  but  he 

still  said  it  was  no  matter.     But  late  at  night,  when  he  was 

i   sitting  in  a  thoughtful  mood  on  the  bed,  we  asked  him  again 

and  he  said: 

"Well,  it  don't  matter;  I  don't  mind  it  now,  but  I  did  not 

like  it  to-day,  you  know,  because  /  don't  tell  anything  that  isn't 

;   so,  and  I  don't  think  the  Colonel  ought  to,  either.    But  he  did ; 

I  he  told  us  at  prayers  in  the  Pilgrims'  tent,  last  night,  and  he 

i   seemed  as  if  he  was  reading  it  out  of  the  Bible,  too,  about  this 

I   country  flowing  with  milk  and  honey,  and  about  the  voice  of 

|   the  turtle  being  heard  in  the  land.     I  thought  that  was  drawing 

;   it  a  little  strong,  about  the  turtles,  anyhow,  but  I  asked  Mr. 

}    Church  if  it  was  so,  and  he  said  it  was,  and  what  Mr.  Church 

•   tells  me,  I  believe.     But  I  sat  there  and  watched  that  turtle 

;    nearly  an  hour  to-day,  and  I  almost  burned  up  in  the  sun; 

;    but  I  never  heard  him  sing.     I  believe  I  sweated  a  double 

>    handful  of  sweat —  I  know  I  did — because  it  got  in  my  eyes, 

and  it  was  running  down  over  my  nose  all  the  time;  and  you 

i    know  my  pants  are  tighter  than  anybody  else's — Paris  foolish- 

i    ness — and  the  buckskin  seat  of  them  got  wet  with  sweat,  and 

then  got  dry  again  and  began  to  draw  up  and  pinch  and  tear 

|    loose — it  was  awful — but  I  never  heard  him  sing.     Finally  I 

said,  This  is  a  fraud — that  is  what  it  is,  it  is  a  fraud — and  if 


348  MARK  TWAIN 

I  had  had  any  sense  I  might  have  known  a  cursed  mud-turtle 
couldn't  sing.  And  then  I  said,  I  don't  wish  to  be  hard  on  this 
fellow,  and  I  will  just  give  him  ten  minutes  to  commence;  ten 
minutes— and  then  if  he  don't,  down  goes  his  building.  But 
he  didn't  commence,  you  know.  I  had  stayed  there  all  that  time 
thinking  maybe  he  might,  pretty  soon,  because  he  kept  on 
raising  his  head  up  and  letting  it  down,  and  drawing  the  skin 
over  his  eyes  for  a  minute  and  then  opening  them  out ^ again, 
as  if  he  was  trying  to  study  up  something  to  sing,  but  just  as 
the  ten  minutes  were  up  and  I  was  all  beat  out  and  blistered, 
he  laid  his  blamed  head  down  on  a  knot  and  went  fast  asleep." 

"It  was  a  little  hard,  after  you  had  waited  so  long." 

"I  should  think  so.  I  said,  Well,  if  you  won't  sing,  yon 
shan't  sleep,  anyway;  and  if  you  fellows  had  let  me  alone 
I  would  have  made  him  shin  out  of  Galilee  quicker  than  any 
turtle  ever  did  yet.  But  it  isn't  any  matter  now — let  it  go.  The 
skin  is  all  off  the  back  of  my  neck." 

About  ten  in  the  morning  we  halted  at  Joseph's  Pit.  This 
is  a  ruined  Khan  of  the  Middle  Ages,  in  one  of  whose  side 
courts  is  a  great  walled  and  arched  pit  with  water  in  it,  and 
this  pit,  one  tradition  says,  is  the  one  Joseph's  brethren  cast  him 
into.  A  more  authentic  tradition,  aided  by  the  geography  of 
the  country,  places  the  pit  in  Dothan,  some  two  days'  journey 
from  here.  However,  since  there  are  many  who  believe  in 
this  present  pit  as  the  true  one,  it  has  its  interest. 

It  is  hard  to  make  a  choice  of  the  most  beautiful  passage 
in  a  book  which  is  so  gemmed  with  beautiful  passages  as  the 
Bible;  but  it  is  certain  that  not  many  things  within  its  lids 
may  take  rank  above  the  exquisite  story  of  Joseph.  Who 
taught  those  ancient  writers  their  simplicity  of  language,  their- 
felicity  of  expression,  their  pathos,  and,  above  all,  their  faculty" 
of  sinking  themselves  entirely  out  of  sight  of  the  reader  and 
making  the  narrative  stand  out  alone  and  seem  to  tell  itself? 
Shakespeare  is  always  present  when  one  reads  his  book; 
Macaulay  is  present  when  we  follow  the  march  of  his  stately 
sentences;  but  the  Old  Testament  writers  are  hidden  from 
view. 

If  the  pit  I  have  been  speaking  of  is  the  right  one,  a  scene 
transpired  there,  long  ages  ago,  which  is  familiar  to  us  all  m 
pictures.  The  sons  of  Jacob  had  been  pasturing  their  flocks 
near  there.  Their  father  grew  uneasy  at  their  long  absence, 
and  sent  Joseph,  his  favorite,  to  see  if  anything  had  gone 
wrong  with  them.  He  traveled  six  or  seven  days'  journey;  he 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  349 

was  only  seventeen  years  old,  and,  boy-like,  he  toiled  through 
that  long  stretch  of  the  vilest,  rockiest,  dustiest  country  in 
Asia,  arrayed  in  the  pride  of  his  heart,  his  beautiful  claw 
hammer  coat  of  many  colors.  Joseph  was  the  favorite,  and 
that  was  one  crime  in  the  eyes  of  his  brethren ;  he  had  dreamed 
dreams,  and  interpreted  them  to  foreshadow  his  elevation  far 
above  all  his  family  in  the  far  future,  and  that  was  another; 
he  was  dressed  well  and  had  doubtless  displayed  the  harmless 
vanity  of  youth  in  keeping  the  fact  prominently  before  his 
brothers.  These  were  crimes  his  elders  fretted  over  among 
themselves  and  proposed  to  punish  when  the  opportunity 
should  offer.  When  they  saw  him  coming  up  from  the  Sea 
of  Galilee,  they  recognized  him  and  were  glad.  They  said, 
"Lo,  here  is  this  dreamer — let  us  kill  him."  But  Reuben 
pleaded  for  his  life,  and  they  spared  it.  But  they  seized  the 
boy,  and  stripped  the  hated  coat  from  his  back  and  pushed 
him  into  the  pit.  They  intended  to  let  him  die  there,  but  Reu 
ben  intended  to  liberate  him  secretly.  However,  while  Reuben 
was  away  for  a  little  while,  the  brethren  sold  Joseph  to  some 
Ishmaelitish  merchants  who  were  journeying  toward  Egypt. 
Such  is  the  history  of  the  pit.  And  the  selfsame  pit  is  there 
in  that  place,  even  to  this  day;  and  there  it  will  remain  until 
the  next  detachment  of  image-breakers  and  tomb-desecrators 
arrives  from  the  Quaker  City  excursion,  and  they  will  infal 
libly  dig  it  up  and  carry  it  away  with  them.  For  behold  in 
them  is  no  reverence  for  the  solemn  monuments  of  the  past, 
and  whithersoever  they  go  they  destroy  and  spare  not. 

Joseph  became  rich,  distinguished,  powerful — as  the  Bible 
expresses  it,  "lord  over  all  the  land  of  Egypt."  Joseph  was  the 
real  king,  the  strength,  the  brain  of  the  monarchy,  though 
Pharaoh  held  the  title.  Joseph  is  one  of  the  truly  great  men 
of  the  Old  Testament.  And  he  was  the  noblest  and  the 
manliest,  save  Esau.  Why  shall  we  not  say  a  good  word  for 
the  princely  Bedouin?  The  only  crime  that  can  be  brought 
against  him  is  that  he  was  unfortunate.  Why  must  everybody 
praise  Joseph's  great-hearted  generosity  to  his  cruel  brethren, 
without  stint  of  fervent  language,  and  fling  only  a  reluctant 
bone  of  praise  to  Esau  for  his  still  sublimer  generosity  to  the 
brother  who  had  wronged  him?  Jacob  took  advantage  of 
Esau's  consuming  hunger  to  rob  him  of  his  birthright  and  the 
great  honor  and  consideration  that  belonged  to  the  position ;  by 
treachery  and  falsehood  he  robbed  him  of  his  father's  blessing ; 
he  made  of  him  a  stranger  in  his  home,  and  a  wanderer.  Yet 


350  MARK  TWAIN 

after  twenty  years  had  passed  away  and  Jacob  met  Esau  and 
fell  at  his  feet  quaking  with  fear  and  begging  piteously  to  be 
spared  the  punishment  he  knew  he  deserved,  what  did  that 
magnificent  savage  do?  He  fell  upon  his  neck  and  embraced 
him!  When  Jacob — who  was  incapable  of  comprehending 
nobility  of  character — still  doubting,  still  fearing,  insisted  upon 
"finding  grace  with  my  lord"  by  the  bribe  of  a  present  of 
cattle,  what  did  the  gorgeous  son  of  the  desert  say? 

"Nay,  I  have  enough,  my  brother ;  keep  that  thou  hast  unto 
thyself !" 

Esau  found  Jacob  rich,  beloved  by  wives  and  children,  and 
traveling  in  state,  with  servants,  herds  of  cattle  and  trains  of 
camels — but  he  himself  was  still  the  uncourted  outcast  this 
brother  had  made  him.  After  thirteen  years  of  romantic  mys 
tery,  the  brethren  who  had  wronged  Joseph,  came,  strangers 
in  a  strange  land,  hungry  and  humble,  to  buy  "a  little  food" ; 
and  being  summoned  to  a  palace,  charged  with  crime,  they 
beheld  in  its  owner  their  wronged  brother ;  they  were  trembling 
beggars — he,  the  lord  of  a  mighty  empire !  What  Joseph 
that  ever  lived  would  have  thrown  away  such  a  chance  to 
"show  off"?  Who  stands  first — outcast  Esau  forgiving  Jacob 
in  prosperity,  or  Joseph  on  a  king's  throne  forgiving  the  ragged 
tremblers  whose  happy  rascality  placed  him  there  ? 

Just  before  we  came  to  Joseph's  Pit,  we  had  "raised"  a  hill, 
and  there,  a  few  miles  before  us,  with  not  a  tree  or  a  shrub 
to  interrupt  the  view,  lay  a  vision  which  millions  of  worshipers 
in  the  far  lands  of  the  earth  would  give  half  their  possessions 
to  see — the  sacred  Sea  of  Galilee ! 

Therefore  we  tarried  only  a  short  time  at  the  pit.  We  rested 
the  horses  and  ourselves,  and  felt  for  a  few  minutes  the  blessecj 
shade  of  the  ancient  buildings.  We  were  out  of  water,  but  the" 
two  or  three  scowling  Arabs,  with  their  long  guns,  who  were 
idling  about  the  place,  said  they  had  none  and  that  there  was 
none  in  the  vicinity.  They  knew  there  was  a  little  brackish 
water  in^the  pit,  but  they  venerated  a  place  made  sacred  by  their 
ancestor's  imprisonment  too  much  to  be  willing  to  see  Christian 
dogs  drink  from  it.  But  Ferguson  tied  rags  and  handkerchiefs 
together  till  he  made  a  rope  long  enough  to  lower  a  vessel  to 
the  bottom,  and  we  drank  and  then  rode  on;  and  in  a  short 
time  we  dismounted  on 'those  shores  which  the  feet  of  the 
Saviour  have  made  holy  ground. 

At  noon  we  took  a  swim  in  the  Sea  of  Galilee — a  blessed 
privilege  in  this  roasting  climate— and  then  lunched  under  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  351 

neglected  old  fig  tree  at  the  fountain  they  call  Ain-et-Tin,  a 
hundred  yards  from  ruined  Capernaum.    fEyery  rivulet  that 
gurgles  out  of  the  rocks  and  sands  of  this  part  of  the  world  is  I 
dubbed  with  the  title  of  "fountain,"  and  people  familiar  with  i. 
the  Hudson,  and  Great  Lakes,  and  the  Mississippi  fall  into  I 
transports  of  admiration  over  them,  and  exhaust  their  powers  | 
of  composition  in  writing  their  praises.     If  all  the  poetry  and  { 
nonsense  tnat  have  been  discharged  upon  the  fountains  and  | 
the  bland  scenery  of  this  region  were  collected  in  a  book,  itt' 
would  make  a  most  valuable  volume  to  burn?) 

During  luncheon,  the  pilgrim  enthusiasts  ofour  party,  who 
had  been  so  light-hearted  and  happy  ever  since  they  touched 
holy  ground  that  they  did  little  but  mutter  incoherent  rhap 
sodies,  could  scarcely  eat,  so  anxious  were  they  to  "take  ship 
ping"  and  sail  in  very  person  upon  the  waters  that  had  borne 
the  vessels  of  the  Apostles.  Their  anxiety  grew  and  their 
excitement  augmented  with  every  fleeting  moment,  until  my 
fears  were  aroused  and  I  began  to  have  misgivings  that  in 
their  present  condition  they  might  break  recklessly  loose  from 
all  considerations  of  prudence  and  buy  a  whole  fleet  of  ships 
to  sail  in  instead  of  hiring  a  single  one  for  an  hour,  as  quiet 
folk  are  wont  to  do.  I  trembled  to  think  of  the  ruined  purses 
this  day's  performances  might  result  in.  I  could  not  help  re 
flecting  bodingly  upon  the  intemperate  zeal  with  which  middle- 
aged  men  are  apt  to  surfeit  themselves  upon  a  seductive  folly 
which  they  have  tasted  for  the  first  time.  And  yet  I  did  not  feel 
that  I  had  a  right  to  be  surprised  at  the  state  of  things  which 
was  giving  me  so  much  concern.  These  men  had  been  taught 
from  infancy  to  revere,  almost  worship,  the  holy  places  where 
on  their  happy  eyes  were  resting  now.  For  many  and  many  a 
year  this  very  picture  had  visited  their  thoughts  by  day  and 
floated  through  their  dreams  by  night.  To  stand  before  it 
in  the  flesh — to  see  it  as  they  saw  it  now — to  sail  upon  the 
hallowed  sea,  and  kiss  the  holy  soil  that  compassed  it  about; 
these  were  aspirations  they  had  cherished  while  a  generation 
dragged  its  lagging  seasons  by  and  left  its  furrows  in  their 
faces  and  its  frosts  upon  their  hair.  To  look  upon  this  picture, 
and  sail  upon  this  sea,  they  had  forsaken  home  and  its  idols 
and  journeyed  thousands  and  thousands  of  miles,  in  weariness 
and  tribulation.  What  wonder  that  the  sordid  lights  of  work 
day  prudence  should  pale  before  the  glory  of  a  hope  like 
theirs  in  the  full  splendor  of  its  fruition  ?  Let  them  squander 
millions!  I  said — who  speaks  of  money  at  a  time  like  this? 


352  MARK  TWAIN 

In  this  frame  of  mind  I  followed,  as  fast  as  I  could,  the 
eager  footsteps  of  the  pilgrims,  and  stood  upon  the  shore  of  the 
lake,  and  swelled,  with  hat  and  voice,  the  frantic  hail  they  sent 
after  the  "ship"  that  was  speeding  by.  It  was  a  success. 
The  toilers  of  the  sea  ran  in  and  beached  their  bark.  Joy  sat 
upon  every  countenance. 

"How  much? — ask  him  how  much,  Ferguson!—  how  much 
to  take  us  all — eight  of  us  and  you — to  Bethsaida,  yonder, 
and  to  the  mouth  of  Jordan,  and  to  the  place  where  the  swine 
ran  down  into  the  sea — quick ! — and  we  want  to  coast  around 
everywhere — everywhere  ! — all  day  long ! — /  could  sail  a  ^year 
in  these  waters !— and  tell  him  we'll  stop  at  Magdala  and  finish 
at  Tiberias! — ask  him  how  much! — anything — anything  what 
ever!— tell  him  we  don't  care  what  the  expense  is!"  [I  said 
to  myself,  I  knew  how  it  would  be.] 

Ferguson — (interpreting) — "He  says  two  napoleons — eight 
dollars." 

One  or  two  countenances  fell.    Then  a  pause. 
"Too  much ! — we'll  give  him  one !" 

I  never  shall  know  how  it  was — I  shudder  yet  when  I  think 
how  the  place  is  given  to  miracles — but  in  a  single  instant  of 
time,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  that  ship  was  twenty  paces  from  the 
shore,  and  speeding  away  like  a  frightened  thing !  Eight  crest 
fallen  creatures  stood  upon  the  shore,  and  oh,  to  think  of  it ! 
this — this — after  all  that  overmastering  ecstasy!  Oh,  shame 
ful,  shameful  ending,  after  such  unseemly  boasting !  It  was 
to  much  like  "Ho !  let  me  at  him !"  followed  by  a  prudent  "Two 
of  you  hold  him — one  can  hold  me !" 

Instantly  there  was  wailing  and  gnashing  of  teeth  in  the 
camp.  The  two  napoleons  were  offered — more  if  necessary—* 
and  pilgrims  and  dragoman  shouted  themselves  hoarse  with 
pleadings  to  the  retreating  boatmen  to  come  back.  But  they 
sailed  serenely  away  and  paid  no  further  heed  to  pilgrims  who 
had  dreamed  all  their  lives  of  some  day  skimming  over  the 
sacred  waters  of  Galilee  and  listening  to  its  hallowed  story  in 
the  whispering  of  its  waves,  and  had  journeyed  countless 
leagues  to  do  it,  and — and  then  concluded  that  the  fare  was  too 
high.  Impertinent  Mohammedan  Arabs,  to  think  such  things 
of  gentlemen  of  another  faith. 

Well,  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  just  submit  and  forego  the 
privilege  of  voyaging  on  Gennesaret,  after  coming  half  around 
the  globe  to  taste  that  pleasure.  There  was  a  time,  when  the 
Saviour  taught  here,  that  boats  were  plenty  among  the  fisher- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  353 

men  of  the  coasts — but  boats  and  fishermen  both  are  gone  now ; 
and  old  Josephus  had  a  fleet  of  men-of-war  in  these  waters 
eighteen  centuries  ago — a  hundred  and  thirty  bold  canoes — but 
they,  also,  have  passed  away  and  left  no  sign.  They  battle  here 
no  more  by  sea,  and  the  commercial  marine  of  Galilee  num 
bers  only  two  small  ships,  just  of  a  pattern  with  the  little  skiffs 
the  disciples  knew.  One  was  lost  to  us  for  good — the  other 
was  miles  away  and  far  out  of  hail.  So  we  mounted  the  horses 
and  rode  grimly  on  toward  Magdala,  cantering  along  in  the 
edge  of  the  water  for  want  of  the  means  of  passing  over  it. 

How  the  pilgrims  abused  each  other!  Each  said  it  was  the 
other's  fault,  and  each  in  turn  denied  it.  No  word  was  spoken 
by  the  sinners — even  the  mildest  sarcasm  might  have  been 
dangerous  at  such  a  time.  Sinners  that  have  been  kept  down 
and  had  examples  held  up  to  them,  and  suffered  frequent 
lectures,  and  been  so  put  upon  in  a  moral  way  and  in  the 
matter  of  going  slow  and  being  serious  and  bottling  up  slang, 
and  so  crowded  in  regard  to  the  matter  of  being  proper  and 
always  and  forever  behaving,  that  their  lives  have  become  a 
burden  to  them,  would  not  lag  behind  pilgrims  at  such  a  time 
as  this,  and  wink  furtively,  and  be  joyful,  and  commit  other 
such  crimes — because  it  would  not  occur  to  them  to  do  it. 
Otherwise  they  would.  But  they  did  do  it,  though — and  it 
did  them  a  world  of  good  to  hear  the  pilgrims  abuse  each  other, 
too.  We  took  an  unworthy  satisfaction  in  seeing  them  fall 
out,  now  and  then,  because  it  showed  that  they  were  only  poor 
human  people  like  us,  after  all. 

So  we  all  rode  down  to  Magdala,  while  the  gnashing  of  teeth 
waxed  and  waned  by  turns,  and  harsh  words  troubled  the 
holy  calm  of  Galilee. 

Lest  any  man  think  I  mean  to  be  ill-natured  when  I  talk 
about  our  pilgrims  as  I  have  been  talking,  I  wish  to  say  in 
all  sincerity  that  I  do  not.  I  would  not  listen  to  lectures  from 
men  I  did  not  like  and  could  not  respect ;  and  none  of  these  can 
say  I  ever  took  their  lectures  unkindly,  or  was  restive  under 
the  infliction,  or  failed  to  try  to  profit  by  what  they  said  to  me. 
They  are  better  men  than  I  am;  I  can  say  that  honestly;  they 
are  good  friends  of  mine,  too — and  besides,  if  they  did  not 
wish  to  be  stirred  up  occasionally  in  print,  why  in  the  mischief 
did  they  travel  with  me?  They  knew  me.  They  knew  my 
liberal  way — that  I  like  to  give  and  take — when  it  is  for  me 
to  give  and  other  people  to  take.  When  one  of  them  threatened 
to  leave  me  in  Damascus  when  I  had  the  cholera,  he  had  no 


354  MARK  TWAIN 

real  idea  of  doing  it — I  know  his  passionate  nature  and  the 
good  impulses  that  underline  it.  And  did  I  not  overhear 
Church,  another  pilgrim,  say  he  did  not  care  who  went  or  who 
stayed,  he  would  stand  by  me  till  I  walked  out  of  Damasus 
on 'my  own  feet  or  was  carried  out  in  a  coffin,  if  it  was  a  year  ? 
And  do  I  not  include  Church  every  time  I  abuse  the  pilgrims 
—and  would  I  be  likely  to  speak  ill-naturedly  of  him?  I  wish 
to  stir  them  up  and  make  them  healthy ;  that  is  all. 

We  had  left  Capernaum  behind  us.  It  was  only  a  shapeless 
ruin.  It  bore  no  semblance  to  a  town,  and  had  nothing  about 
it  to  suggest  that  it  had  ever  been  a  town.  But  all  desolate 
and  unpeopled  as  it  was,  it  was  illustrious  ground.  From  it 
sprang  that  tree  of  Christianity  whose  broad  arms  overshadow 
so  many  distant  lands  to-day.  After  Christ  was  tempted  of 
the  devil  in  the  desert,  he  came  here  and  began  his  teachings ; 
and  during  the  three  or  four  years  he  lived  afterward,  this 
place  was  his  home  almost  altogether.  He  began  to  heal  the 
sick,  and  his  fame  soon  spread  so  widely  that  sufferers  came 
from  Syria  and  beyond  Jordan,  and  even  from  Jerusalem, 
several  days'  journey  away,  to  be  cured  of  their  diseases.  Here 
he  healed  the  centurion's  servant  and  Peter's  mother-in-law, 
and  multitudes  of  the  lame  and  the  blind  and  persons  possessed 
of  devils ;  and  here,  also,  he  raised  Jairus's  daughter  from  the 
dead.  He  went  into  a  ship  with  his  disciples,  and  when  they 
roused  him  from  sleep  in  the  midst  of  a  storm,  he  quieted  the 
winds  and  lulled  the  troubled  sea  to  rest  with  his  voice.  He 
passed  over  to  the  other  side,  a  few  miles  away,  and  relieved 
two  men  of  devils,  which  passed  into  some  swine.  After  his 
return  he  called  Matthew  from  the  receipt  of  customs,  per 
formed  some  cures,  and  created  scandal  by  eating  with  publi* 
cans  and  sinners.  Then  he  went  healing  and  teaching  through* 
Galilee,  and  even  journeyed  to  Tyre  and  Sidon.  He  chose  the 
twelve  disciples,  and  sent  them  abroad  to  preach  the  new 
gospel.  He  worked  miracles  in  Bethsaida  and  Chorazin— • 
villages  two  or  three  miles  from  Capernaum.  It  was  near 
one  of  them  that  the  miraculous  draft  of  fish.es  is  supposed  to 
have  been  taken,  and  it  was  in  the  desert  places  near  "the  other 
that  he  fed  the  thousands  by  the  miracles  of  the  loaves  and 
fishes.  He  cursed  them  both,  and  Capernaum  also,  for  not 
repenting,  after  all  the  gfeat  works  he  had  done  in  their  midst, 
and  prophesied  against  them.  They  are  all  in  ruins  now— 
which  is  gratifying  to  the  pilgrims,  for.  as  usual,  they  fit  the 
eternal  words  of  gods  to  the  evanescent  things  of  this  earth ; 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  355 

Christ,  it  is  more  probable,  referred  to  the  people,  not  their 
shabby  villages  of  wigwams;  he  said  it  would  be  sad  for  them 
at  "the  Day  of  Judgment" — and  what  business  have  mud-hovels 
at  the  Day  of  Judgment?  it  would  not  affect  the  prophecy  in 
the  least — it  would  neither  prove  it  nor  disprove  it — if  these 
towns  were  splendid  cities  now  instead  of  the  almost  vanished 
ruins  they  are.  Christ  visited  Magdala,  which  is  near  by 
Capernaum,  and  he  also  visited  Cesarea  Philippi.  He  went  up 
to  his  old  home  at  Nazareth,  and  saw  his  brothers  Joses,  and 
Judas,  and  James,  and  Simon — those  persons  who,  being  own 
brothers  to  Jesus  Christ,  one  would  expect  to  hear  mentioned 
sometimes,  yet  who  ever  saw  their  names  in  a  newspaper  or 
heard  them  from  a  pulpit?  Who  ever  inquires  what  manner 
of  youths  they  were ;  and  whether  they  slept  with  Jesus,  played 
with  him  and  romped  about  him ;  quarreled  with  him  concern- 
yig  toys  and  trifles;  struck  him  in  anger,  not  suspecting  what 
he  was  ?  Who  ever  wonders  what  they  thought  when  they  saw 
him  come  back  to  Nazareth  a  celebrity,  and  looked  long  at  his 
unfamiliar  face  to  make  sure,  and  then  said,  "It  is  Jesus"? 
Who  wonders  what  passed  in  their  minds  when  they  saw  this 
brother  (who  was  only  a  brother  to  them,  however  much  he 
might  be  to  others  a  mysterious  stranger  who  was  a  god  and 
had  stood  face  to  face  with  God  above  the  clods)  doing  strange 
miracles  with  crowds  of  astonished  people  for  witnesses?  Who 
wonders  if  the  brothers  of  Jesus  asked  him  to  come  home  with 
them,  and  said  his  mother  and  his  sisters  were  grieved  at  his 
long  absence,  and  would  be  wild  with  delight  to  see  his  face 
again?  Who  ever  gives  a  thought  to  the  sisters  of  Jesus  at 
all  ? — yet  he  had  sisters ;  and  memories  of  them  must  have 
stolen  into  his  mind  often  when  he  was  ill  treated  among 
strangers ;  when  he  was  homeless  and  said  he  had  not  where 
to  lay  his  head ;  when  all  deserted  him,  even  Peter,  and  he  stood 
alone  among  his  enemies. 

Christ  did  few  miracles  in  Nazareth,  and  stayed  but  a  little 
while.  The  people  said,  "  This  the  Son  of  God !  Why,  his 
father  is  nothing  but  a  carpenter.  We  know  the  family.  We 
see  them  every  day.  Are  not  his  brothers  named  so  and  so, 
and  his  sisters  so  and  so,  and  is  not  his  mother  the  person  they 
call  Mary?  This  is  absurd."  He  did  not  curse  his  home,  but 
he  shook  its  dust  from  his  feet  and  went  away. 

Capernaum  lies  close  to  the  edge  of  the  little  sea,  in  a  small 
plain  some  five  miles  long  and  a  mile  or  two  wide,  which  is 
mildly  adorned  with  oleanders  which  look  all  the  better  con- 


356  MARK  TWAIN 

trasted  with  the  bald  hills  and  the  howling  deserts  which  sur 
round  them,  but  they  are  not  as  deliriously  beautiful  as  the 
books  paint  them.  If  one  be  calm  and  resolute  he  can  look  upon 
their  comeliness  and  live. 

5  One  of  the  most  astonishing  things  that  have  yet  fallen 
I  under  our  observation  is  the  exceedingly  small  portion  of  the 
j  earth  jrorn  which  sprang  the  now  flourishing  plant  of  Chris- 
'tianity*^  The  longest  journey  jofir  Saviour  ever  performed 
was  from  here  to  Jerusalem — about  one  hundred  to  one  hun 
dred  and  twenty  miles.  The  next  longest  was  from  here  to 
Sidon — say  about  sixty  or  seventy  miles.  Instead  of  being- 
wide  apart — as  American  appreciation  of  distances  would  nat 
urally  suggest — the  places  made  most  particularly  celebrated 
by  the  presence  of  Christ  are  nearly  all  right  here  in  full 
view,  and  within  cannon-shot  of  Capernaum.  Leaving  out  two 
or  three  three  short  journeys  of  the  Saviour,  he  spent  his  life, 
preached  his  gospel,  and  performed  his  miracles  within  a  com 
pass  no  larger  than  an  ordinary  county  in  the  United  States. 
It  is  as  much  as  I  can  do  to  comprehend  this  stupefying  fact. 
How  it  wears  a  man  out  to  have  to  read  up  a  hundred  pages 
of  history  every  two  or  three  miles — for  verily  the  celebrated 
localities  of  Palestine  occur  that  close  together.  How  wearily, 
how  bewilderingly  they  swarm  about  your  path! 

In  due  time  we  reached  the  ancient  "village  of  Magdala. 


CHAPTER  XLVIII 

MAGDALA  is  not  a  beautiful  place.  It  is  thoroughly 
Syrian,  and  that  is  to  say  that  it  is  thoroughly  ugly, 
and  cramped,  squalid,  uncomfortable,  and  filthy- 
just  the  style  of  cities  that  have  adorned  the  country  since 
Adam's  time,  as  all  writers  have  labored  hard  to  prove,  and 
have  succeeded.  The  streets  of  Magclala  are  anywhere  from 
three  to  six  feet  wide,  and  reeking  with  uncleanliness.  The 
houses  are  from  five  to  seven  feet  high,  and  all  built  upon  one 
arbitrary  plan — the  ungraceful  form  of  a  dry-goods  box.  The 
sides  are  daubed  with  a  smooth  white  plaster,  and  tastefully 
frescoed  aloft  and  alow  with  disks  of  camel-dung  placed  there 
to  dry.  This  gives  the  edifice  the  romantic  appearance  of  hav 
ing  been  riddled  with  cannon-balls,  and  imparts  to  it  a  very 
warlike  aspect.  When  the  artist  has  arranged  his  materials 
with  an  eye  to  just  proportion — the  small  and  the  large  flakes 
in  alternate  rows,  and  separated  by  carefully  considered  in 
tervals — I  know  of  nothing  more  cheerful  to  look  upon  than 
a  spirited  Syrian  fresco.  The  flat,  plastered  roof  is  garnished 
by  picturesque  stacks  of  fresco  materials,  which,  having  be 
come  thoroughly  dried  and  cured,  are  placed  there  where  it 
will  be  convenient.  It  is  used  for  fuel.  There  is  no  timber 
of  any  consequence  in  Palestine — none  at  all  to  waste  upon 
fires — and  neither  are  there  any  mines  of  coal.  If  my  descrip 
tion  has  been  intelligible,  you  will  perceive,  now,  that  a  square, 
flat-roofed  hovel,  neatly  frescoed,  with  its  wall-tops  gallantly 
bastioned  and  turreted  with  dried  camel-refuse,  gives  to  a 
landscape  a  feature  that  is  exceedingly  festive  and  picturesque, 
especially  if  one  is  careful  to  remember  to  stick  in  a  cat  wher 
ever,  about  the  premises,  there  is  room  for  a  cat  to  sit.  There 
are  no  windows  to  a  Syrian  hut,  and  no  chimneys.  When  I 
used  to  read  that  they  let  a  bedridden  man  down  through  the 
roof  of  a  house  in  Capernaum  to  get  him  into  the  presence 
of  the  Saviour,  I  generally  had  a  three-story  brick  in  my  mind, 
and  marveled  that  they  did  not  break  his  neck  with  the  strange 
experiment.  I  perceive  now  however,  that  they  might  have 
taken  him  by  the  heels  and  thrown  him  clear  over  the  house 

357 


358  MARK  TWAIN 

without  discommoding  him  very  much.  Palestine  is  ^  not 
changed  any  since  those  days,  in  manners,  customs,  architec 
ture,  or  people. 

As  we  rode  into  Magdala  not  a  soul  was  visible.  But  the 
ring  of  the  horses'  hoofs  roused  the  stupid  population,  and 
they  all  came  trooping  out — old  men  and  old  women,  boys  and 
girls,  the  blind,  the  crazy,  and  the  crippled,  all  in  ragged, 
soiled,  and  scanty  raiment,  and  all  abject  beggars  by  nature, 
instinct,  and  education.  How  the  vermin-tortured  vagabonds 
did  swarm!  How  they  showed  their  scars  and  sores,  and 
piteously  pointed  to  their  maimed  and  crooked  limbs,  and 
begged  with  their  pleading  eyes  for  charity !  We  had  invoked 
a  spirit  we  could  not  lay.  They  hung  to  the  horses*  tails, 
clung  to  their  manes  and  the  stirrups,  closed  in  on  every  side 
in  scorn  of  dangerous  hoofs — and  out  of  their  infidel  throats, 
vith  one  accord,  burst  an  agonizing  and  most  infernal  chorus : 
"Howajji,  bucksheesh!  howajji,  bucksheesh!  howajji,  buck- 
sheesh !  bucksheesh !  bucksheesh !"  I  never  was  in  a  storm  like 
that  before. 

As  we  paid  the  bucksheesh  out  to  sore-eyed  children  and 
brown,  buxom  girls  with  repulsively  tattooed  lips  and  chins, 
we  filed  through  the  town  and  by  many  an  exquisite  fresco, 
till  we  came  to  a  bramble-infested  inclosure  and  a  Roman- 
looking  ruin  which  had  been  the  veritable  dwelling  of  St. 
Mary  Magdalene,  the  friend  and  follower  of  Jesus.  The 
guide  believed  it,  and  so  did  I.  I  could  not  well  do  otherwise, 
with  the  house  right  there  before  my  eyes  as  plain  as  day. 
The  pilgrims  took  down  portions  of  the  front  walls  for  speci 
mens,  as  is  their  honored  custom,  and  then  we  departed. 

We  are  camped  in  this  place,  now,  just  within  the  city  walls 
of  Tiberias.  We  went  into  the  town  before  nightfall  and; 
looked  at  its  people — we  cared  nothing  about  its  houses.  Its 
people  are  best  examined  at  a  distance.  They  are  particularly 
uncomely  ^  Jews,  Arabs,  and  negroes.  Squalor  and  poverty 
are  the  pride  of  Tiberias.  The  young  women  wear  their  dower 
strung  upon  a  strong  wire  that  curves  downward  from  the 
top  of  the  head  to  the  jaw — Turkish  silver  coins  which  they 
have  raked  together  or  inherited.  Most  of  these  maidens  were 
not  wealthy,  but  some  few  had  been  very  kindly  dealt  with  by 
fortune.  I  saw  heiresses  there  worth,  in  their  own  right — 
worth,  well,  I  suppose  I  might  venture  to  say,  as  much  as  nine 
dollars  and  a  half.  But  such  cases  are  rare.  When  you  come 
across  one  of  these,  she  naturally  puts  on  airs.  She  will  not 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  359 

ask  for  bucksheesh.  She  will  not  even  permit  of  undue  famil 
iarity.  She  assumes  a  crushing  dignity  and  goes  on  serenely 
practising  with  her  fine-tooth  comb  and  quoting  poetry  just 
the  same  as  if  you  were  not  present  at  all.  Some  people  can 
not  stand  prosperity. 

They  say  that  the  long-nosed,  lanky,  dyspeptic-looking  body- 
snatchers,  with  the  indescribable  hats  on,  and  a  long  curl 
dangling  down  in  front  of  each  ear,  are  the  old,  familiar, 
self-righteous  Pharisees  we  read  of  in  the  Scriptures.  Verily, 
they  look  it.  Judging  merely  by  their  general  style,  and  with 
out  other  evidence,  one  might  easily  suspect  that  self -righteous 
ness  was  their  specialty. 

From  various  authorities  I  have  culled  information  con 
cerning  Tiberias.  It  was  built  by  Herod  Antipas,  the  mur 
derer  of  John  the  Baptist,  and  named  after  the  Emperor 
'Tiberius.  It  is  believed  that  it  stands  upon  the  site  of  what 
must  have  been,  ages  ago,  a  city  of  considerable  architectural 
pretensions,  judging  by  the  fine  porphyry  pillars  that  are  scat 
tered  through  Tiberias  and  down  the  lake-shore  southward. 
These  were  fluted  once,  and  yet,  although  the  stone  is  about 
as  hard  as  iron,  the  flutings  are  almost  worn  away.  These 
pillars  are  small,  and  doubtless  the  edifices  they  adorned  were 
distinguished  more  for  elegance  than  grandeur.  This  modern 
town — Tiberias — is  only  mentioned  in  the  New  Testament; 
never  in  the  Old. 

The  Sanhedrim  met  here  last,  and  for  three  hundred  years 
Tiberias  was  the  metropolis  of  the  Jews  in  Palestine.  It  is 
one  of  the  four  holy  cities  of  the  Israelites,  and  is  to  them 
what  Mecca  is  to  the  Mohammedan  and  Jerusalem  to  the 
Christian.  It  has  been  the  abiding-place  of  many  learned  and 
famous  Jewish  rabbins.  They  lie  buried  here,  and  near  them 
lie  also  twenty-five  thousand  of  their  faith  who  traveled 
far  to  be  near  them  while  they  lived  and  lie  with  them  v/hen 
they  died.  The  great  Rabbi  Ben  Israel  spent  three  years  here 
in  the  early  part  of  the  third  century.  He  is  dead,  now. 

The  celebrated  Sea  of  Galilee  is  not  so  large  a  sea  as  Lake 
Tahoe1  by  a  good  deal — it  is  just  about  two-thirds  as  large. 

1I  measure  all  lakes  by  Tahoe,  partly  because  I  am  far  more  familiar 
with  it  than  with  any  other,  and  partly  because  I  have  such  a  high 
admiration  for  it  and  such  a  world  of  pleasant  recollections  of  it,  that 
it  is  very  nearly  impossible  for  me  to  speak  of  lakes  and  not  mention  it. 


360  MARK  TWAIN 

And  when  we  come  to  speak  of  beauty,  this  sea  is  no  more  to 
be  compared  to  Tahoe  than  a  meridian  of  longitude  is  to  a. 
rainbow.  The  dim  waters  of  this  pool  cannot  suggest  the 
limpid  brilliancy  of  Tahoe;  these  low,  shaven,  yellow  hillocks 
of  rocks  and  sand,  so  devoid  of  perspective,  cannot  suggest  the 
grand  peaks  that  compass  Tahoe  like  a  wall,  and  whose  ribbed 
and  chasmed  fronts  are  clad  with  stately  pines  that  seem  to 
grow  small  and  smaller  as  they  climb,  till  one  might  fancy 
them  reduced  to  weeds  and  sjirubs  far  upward,  where  they 
join  the  everlasting  snows.  ^Silence  and  solitude  brood  over 

?  I  Tahoe;  and  silence  and  solitude  brood  also  over  this  lake  of 
•  Gennesaret.     But  the  solitude  of  the  one  is  as  cheerful  and 

i  ,  fascinating  as  the  solitude  of  the  other  is  dismal  and  repellent^ 
In  the  early  morning  one  watches  the  silent  battle  of  dawn 
and  darkness  upon  the  waters  of  Tahoe  with  a  placid  interest; 
but  when  the  shadows  sulk  away  one  by  one  the  hidden 
beauties  of  the  shore  unfold  themselves  in  the  full  splendor  of 
noon;  when  the  still  surface  is  belted  like  a  rainbow  with 
broad  bars  of  blue  and  green  and  white,  half  the  distance  from 
circumference  to  center;  when,  in  the  lazy  summer  afternoon, 
he  lies  in  a  boat,  far  out  to  where  the  dead  blue  of  the  deep 
water  begins,  and  smokes  the  pipe  of  peace  and  idly  winks  at 
the  distant  crags  and  patches  of  snow  from  under  his  cap-brim ; 
when  the  boat  drifts  shoreward  to  the  white  water,  and  he  lolls 
over  the  gunwale  and  gazes  by  the  hour  down  through  the 
crystal  depths  and  notes  the  colors  of  the  pebbles  and  reviews 
the  finny  armies  gliding  in  procession  a  hundred  feet  be 
low;  when  at  night  he  sees  moon  and  stars,  mountain  ridges 
feathered  with  pines,  jutting  white  capes,  bold  promontories, 
grand  sweeps  of  rugged  scenery  topped  with  bald,  glimmering 
peaks,  all  magnificently  pictured  in  the  polished  mirror  of 
the  lake,  in  richest,  softest  detail,  the  tranquil  interest  that  was 
born  with  the  morning  deepens  and  deepens,  by  sure  decrees, 
till  it  culminates  at  last  in  resistless  fascination ! 

It  is  solitude,  for  birds  and  squirrels  on  the  shore  and  fishes 
m  the  water  are  all  the  creatures  that  are  near  to  make  it 
otherwise,  but  it  is  not  the  sotf  of  solitude  to  make  one  dreary. 
Lome  to  Galilee  for  that,  (if  these  unpeopled  deserts,  these 
rusty  mounds  of  barrenness,  that  never,  never,  never  do  shake 
the  glare  from  their  harsh  outlines,  and  fade  and  faint  into 
vague  perspective;  that  melancholy  ruin  of  Capernaum;  this 
stupid  village  of  Tiberias,  slumbering  under  its  six  funereal 
plumes  of  palms;  yonder  desolate  declivity  where  the  swine 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  361 

of  the  miracle  ran  down  into  the  sea,  doubtless  thought  it  was 
better  to  swallow  a  devil  or  two  and  get  drowned  into  the 
bargain  than  have  to  live  longer  in  such  a  place;  this  cloud 
less,  blistering  sky;  this  solemn,  sailless,  tintless  lake,  reposing 
within  its  rim  of  yellow  hills  and  low,  steep  banks,  and  looking 
just  as  expressionless  and  unpoetical  (when  we  leave  its  sub 
lime  history  out  of  the  question)  as  any  metropolitan  reser 
voir  in  Christendom — if  these  things  are  not  food  for  rock 
rne  to  sleep,  mother,  none  exist,  I  think!) 

But  I  should  not  offer  all  the  evidence  for  the  prosecution 
and  leave  the  defense  unheard.  Wm.  C.  Grimes  deposes  as 
follows : 

We  had  taken  ship  to  go  over  to  the  other  side.  The  sea  was 
not  more  than  six  miles  wide.  Of  the  beauty  of  the  scene,  however, 
I  cannot  say  enough,  nor  can  I  imagine  where  those  travelers  carried 
their  eyes  who  have  described  the  scenery  of  the  lake  as  tame  or  un 
interesting.  The  first  great  characteristic  of  it  is  the  deep  basin  in 
which  it  lies.  This  is  from  three  to  four  hundred  feet  deep  on  all 
sides  except  at  the  lower  end,  and  the  sharp  slope  of  the  banks,  which 
are  all  of  the  richest  green,  is  broken  and  diversified  by  the  wadys  and 
watercourses  which  work  their  way  down  through  the  sides  of  the  basin, 
forming  dark  chasms  or  light  sunny  valleys.  Near  Tiberias  these 
banks  are  rocky,  and  ancient  sepulchers  open  in  them,  with  their 
doors  towards  the  water.  They  selected  grand  spots,  as  did  the 
Egyptians  of  old,  for  burial  places,  as  if  they  designed  that  when 
the  voice  of  God  should  reach  the  sleepers  they  should  walk  forth  and 
open  their  eyes  on  scenes  of  glorious  beauty.  On  the  east,  the  wild 
and  desolate  mountains  contrast  finely  with  the  deep-blue  lake;  and 
toward  the  north,  sublime  and  majestic,  Hermon  looks  down  on  the 
sea,  lifting  his  white  crown  to  heaven  with  the  pride  of  a  hill  that 
has  seen  the  departing  footsteps  of  a  hundred  generations.  On  the 
northeast  shore  of  the  sea  was  a  single  tree,  and  this  is  the  only  tree 
of  any  size  visible  from. the  water  of  the  lake,  except  a  few  lonely 
palms  in  the  city  of  Tiberias,  and  by  its  solitary  position  attracts  more 
attention  than  would  a  forest.  The  whole  appearance  of  the  scene 
is  precisely  what  we  would  expect  and  desire  the  scenery  of  Gennesaret 
to  be,  grand  beauty,  but  quiet  calm.  The  very  mountains  are  calm. 

It  is  an  ingeniously  written  description,  and  well  calcu 
lated  to  deceive.  But  if  the  paint  and  the  ribbons  and  the 
flowers  be  stripped  from  it,  a  skeleton  will  be  found  beneath. 

So  stripped,  there  remains  a  lake  six  miles  wide  and  neutral 
in  color;  with  steep  green  banks,  unrelieved  by  shrubbery; 
at  one  end  bare,  unsightly  rocks,  with  (almost  invisible) 
holes  in  them  of  no  consequence  to  the  picture;  eastward, 
"wild  and  desolate  mountains"  (low,  desolate  hills,  he  should 


362  MARK  TWAIN 

have  said)  ;  in  the  north,  a  mountain  called  Hermon,  with 
snow  on  it;  peculiarity  of  the  picture,  "calmness";  its  promi 
nent  feature,  one  tree. 

No  ingenuity  could  make  such  a  picture  beautiful— to  one's 
actual  vision. 

(T  claim  the  right  to  correct  misstatements,  and  have  so 
corrected  the  color  of  the  water  in  the  above  recapitulatiorj) 
The  waters  of  Gennesaret  are  of  an  exceedingly  mild  blue, 
even  from  a  high  elevation  and  a  distance  of  five  miles.  Close 
at  hand  (the  witness  was  sailing  on  the  lake),  it  is  hardly 
proper  to  call  them  blue  at  all,  much  less  "deep"  blue.  I 
wish  to  state,  also,  not  as  a  correction,  but  as  a  matter  of 
opinion,  that  Mount  Hermon  is  not  a  striking  or  picturesque 
mountain,  by  any  means,  being  too  near  the  height  of  its 
immediate  neighbors  to  be  so.  That  is  all.  I  do  not  object 
to  the  witness  dragging  a  mountain  forty-five  miles  to  help  the 
scenery  under  consideration,  because  it  is  entirely  proper 
to  do  it,  and,  besides,  the  picture  needs  it. 

"C.  W.  E."  (of  Life  in  the  Holy  Land)  deposes  as  follows : 

A  beautiful  sea  lies  unbosomed  among  the  Galilean  hills,  in  the 
midst  of  that  land  once  possessed  by  Zebulon  and  Naphtaii,  Asher 
and  Dan.  The  azure  of  the  sky  penetrates  the  depths  of  the  lake,  and 
the  waters  are  sweet  and  cool.  On  the  west,  stretch  broad  fertile 
plains;  on  the  north  the  rocky  shores  rise  step  by  step  until  in  the 
far  distance  tower  the  snowy  heights  of  Hermon ;  on  the  east  through  a 
misty  veil  are  seen  the  high  plains  of  Perea,  which  stretch  away  in 
rugged  mountains  leading  the  mind  by  varied  paths  toward  Jerusalem 
the  Holy.  Flowers  bloom  in  this  terrestrial  paradise,  once  beautiful 
and  verdant  with  waving  trees;  singing  birds  enchant  the  ear;  the 
turtle-dove  soothes  with  its  soft  note;  the  crested  lark  sends  up  its 
song  toward  heaven,  and  the  grave  and  stately  stork  inspires  the  mine! 
with  thought,  and  leads  it  on  to  meditation  and  repose.  Life  here  was' 
once  idyllic,  charming;  here  were  once  no  rich,  no  poor,  no  high,  no 
low.  It  was  a  world  of  ease,  simplicity,  and  beauty;  now  it  is  a  scene 
of  desolation  and  misery. 

This  is  not  an  ingenious  picture.  It  is  the  worst  I  ever 
saw._  It  describes  in  elaborate  detail  what  it  terms  a  "ter 
restrial  paradise,"  and  closes  with  the  startling  information 
that  this  paradise  is  "a  scene  of  desolation  and  misery/' 

I  have  given  two  fair;  average  specimens  of  the  character 
of  the  testimony  offered  by  the  majority  of  the  writers  who 
visit  this  region.  One  says,  "Of  the  beauty  of  the  scene  I 
cannot  say  enough,"  and  then  proceeds  to  cover  up  with  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  363 

woof  of  glittering  sentences  a  thing  which,  when  stripped,  for 
inspection,  proves  to  be  only  an  unobtrusive  basin  of  water, 
some  mountainous  desolation,  and  one  tree.  The  other,  after 
a  conscientious  effort  to  build  a  terrestrial  paradise  out  of 
the  same  materials,  with  the  addition  of  a  "grave  and  stately 
stork,"  spoils  it  all  by  blundering  upon  the  ghastly  truth  at  the 
last 

(Nearly  every  book  concerning  Galilee  and  its  lake  describes 
the  scenery  as  beautiful?)  No — not  always  so  straightforward 
as  that.  Sometimes  trie  impression  intentionally  conveyed  is 
that  it  is  beautiful,  at  the  same  time  that  the  author  is  care 
ful  not  to  say  that  it  is,  in  plain  Saxon.  CBut  a  careful  analysis 
of  these  descriptions  will  show  that  the  materials  of  which  they 
are  formed  are  not  individually  beautiful  and  cannot  be 
wrought  into  combinations  that  are  beautiful.  The  veneration 
and  the  affection  which  some  of  these  men  felt  for  the  scenes 
they  were  speaking  of  heated  their  fancies  and  biased  their 
judgment;  but  the  pleasant  falsities  they  wrote  were  full  of 
honest  sincerity,  at  any  rate.  Others  wrote  as  they  did,  be 
cause  they  feared  it  would  be  unpopular  to  write  otherwise?) 
Others  were  hypocrites  and  deliberately  meant  to  deceive.  Any 
of  them  would  say  in  a  moment,  if  asked,  that  it  was  always 
right  and  always  best  to  tell  the  truth.  They  would  say  that, 
at  any  rate,  if  they  did  not  perceive  the  drift  of  the  question. 
But  why  should  not  the  truth  be  spoken  of  this  region? 
Is  the  truth  harmful?  Has  it  ever  needed  to  hide  its  face? 
God  made  the  Sea  of  Galilee  and  its  surroundings  as  they  are. 
Is  it  the  province  of  Mr.  Grimes  to  improve  upon  the  work? 

Qjam  sure,  from  the  tenor  of  books  I  have  read,  that  many\ 
who  have  visited  this  land  in  years  gone  by,  were  Pres-  I 
byterians,  and  came  seeking  evidence  in  support  of  their  partic-  j 
ular  creed ;  they  found  a  Presbyterian  Palestine,  and  they 
had  already  made  up  their  minds  to  find  no  other,  though  pos 
sibly  they  did  not  know  it,  being  blinded  by  their  zeal.  Others 
were  Baptists,  seeking  Baptist  evidences  and  a  Baptist  Pal 
estine.  Others  were  Catholics,  Methodists,  Episcopalians,  seek 
ing  evidences  indorsing  their  several  creeds,  and  a  Catholic 
a  Methodist,  and  Episcopalian  Palestine.  Honest  as  these 
men's  intentions  may  have  been,  they  were  full  of  partialities 
and  prejudices,  they  entered  the  country  with  their  verdicts 
already  prepared,  and  they  could  no  more  write  dispassionately 
and  impartially  about  it  than  they  could  about  their  own  wive; 
and  children.  Our  pilgrims  have  brought  their  verdicts  witl 


364  MARK  TWAIN 

/I  them.     They  have  shown  it  in  their  conversation  ever  since 
1 1  we  left  Beirout.     I  can  almost  tell,  in  set  phrase,  what  they 


n\ 

and  lesser  men  follow  and  see  with  the  author's  eyes  instead 
of  their  own,  and  speak  with  his  tongue.  What  the  pilgrims 
said  at  Cesarea  Philippi  surprised  me  with  its  wisdom.  I 
found  it  afterward  in  Robinson.  What  they  said  when  Gen- 
nesaret  burst  upon  their  vision  charmed  me  with  its  grace.  I 
find  it  in  Mr.  Thompson's  Laud  end  the  Book.  They  have 
spoken  often,  in  happily  worded  language  which  never  varied, 
of  how  they  mean  to  lay  their  weary  heads  upon  a  stone  at 
Bethel,  as  Jacob  did,  and  close  their  dim  eyes,  and  dream, 
perchance,  of  angels  descending  out  of  heaven  on  a  ladder. 
It  was  very  pretty.  But  I  have  recognized  the  weary  head  and 
the  dim  eyes,  finally.  They  borrowed  the  idea — and  the  words 
—-and  the  construction — and  the  punctuation — from  Grimes. 
[The  Pilgrims  will  tell  of  Palestine,  when  they  get  home,  not 
as  it  appeared  to  them,  but  as  it  appeared  to  Thompson  and 
Robinson  and  Grimes — with  the  tints  varied  to  suit  each  pil 
grim's  creecE^ 

Pilgrims,  sinners,  and  Arabs  are  all  abed,  now,  and  the  camp 
is  still.  Labor  in  loneliness  is  irksome.  Since  I  made  my  last 
few  notes,  I  have  been  sitting  outside  the  tent  for  half  an 
hour.  Night  is  the  time  to  see  Galilee.  Gennesaret  under 
these  lustrous  stars  has  nothing  repulsive  about  it.  Gen 
nesaret  with  the  glittering  reflections  of  the  constellations 
flecking  its  surface,  almost  makes.jne  regret  that  I  ever  saw  the 
rude  glare  of  the  day  upon  it.  ^ts  history  and  its  associations 
are  its  chiefest  charm,  in  any  eyes,  and  the  spells  they  weavf 
are  feeble  in  the  searching  tight  of  the  sun  Then,  we  scarcely 
feel  the  fetters.  Our  thoughts  wander  constantly  to  the  prac 
tical  concerns  of  life,  and  refuse  to  dwell  upon  things  that  seem 
vague  and  unreal.  But  when  the  day  is  done,  even  the  most 
unimpressible  must  yield  to  the  dreamy  influences  of  this 
tranquil  starlight.  The  old  traditions  of 'the  place  steal  upon 
his  memory  and  haunt  his  reveries,  and  then  his  fancy  clothes 
all  sights  and  sounds  with  the  supernatural.  In  the  lapping 
of  the  waves  upon  the,  beach,  he  hears  the  dip  of  ghostly 
oars;  in  the  secret  noises  of  the  night  he  hears  spirit  voices;  in 
the  soft  sweep  of  the  breeze,  the  rush  of  invisible  wings. 
Phantom  ships  are  on  the  sea,  the  dead  of  twenty  centuries 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  365 

come  forth  from  the  tombs,  and  in  the  dirges  of  the  night// 
wind  the  songs  of  old  forgotten  ages  find  utterance  again?} 

In  the  starlight,  Galilee  has  no  boundaries  but  the  broacTcom- 
pass  of  the  heavens,  and  is  a  theater  meet  for  great  events ; 
meet  for  the  birth  of  a  religion  able  to  save  a  world ;  and  meet 
for  the  stately  Figure  appointed  to  stand  upon  its  stage  and 
proclaim  its  high  decrees.  But  in  the  sunlight,  one  says:  Is 
it  for  the  deeds  which  were  done  and  the  words  which  were 
spoken  in  this  little  acre  of  rocks  and  sand  eighteen  centuries 
gone,  that  the  bells  are  ringing  to-day  in  the  remote  islands 
of  the  sea  and  far  and  wide  over  continents  that  clasp  the 
circymference  of  the  huge  globe? 

(One  can  comprehend  it  only  when  night  has  hidden  all  in-     . . 
congruities  and  created  a  theater  proper  for  so  grand  a  drama.*"-  f 


CHAPTER  XLIX 

WE  took  another  swim  in  the  Sea  of  Galilee  at  twilight 
yesterday,  and  another  at  sunrise  this  morning.  We 
have  not  sailed,  but  three  swims  are  equal  to  a  sail, 
are  they  not?  There  were  plenty  of  fish  visible  in  the  water, 
but  we  have  no  outside  aids  in  this  pilgrimage  but  Tent  Life 
in  the  Holy  Land,  The  Land  and  the  Book,  and  other  literature 
of  like  description — no  fishing-tackle.  There  were  no  fish  to 
be  had  in  the  village  of  Tiberias.  True,  we  saw  two  or  three 
vagabonds  mending  their  nets,  but  never  trying  to  catch  any 
thing  with  them. 

We  did  not  go  to  the  ancient  warm  baths  two  miles  be 
low  Tiberias.  I  had  no  desire  in  the  world  to  go  there.  This 
seemed  a  little  strange,  and  prompted  me  to  try  to  discover 
what  the  cause  of  this  unreasonable  indifference  was.  It 
turned  out  to  be  simply  because  Pliny  mentions  them.  I 
have  conceived  a  sort  of  unwarrantable  unfriendliness  toward 
Pliny  and  St.  Paul,  because  it  seems  as  if  I  can  never  ferret 
out  a  place  that  I  can  have  to  myself.  It  always  and  eternally 
transpires  that  St.  Paul  has  been  to  that  place,  and  Pliny  has 
"mentioned"  it. 

In  the  early  morning  we  mounted  and  started.  And  then 
a  weird  apparition  marched  forth  at  the  head  of  the  procession 
— a  pirate,  I  thought,  if  ever  a  pirate  dwelt  upon  land.  It 
was  a  tall  Arab,  as  swarthy  as  an  Indian,  young — say  thirty 
years  of  age.  On  his  head  he  had  closely  bound  a  gorgeous 
yellow  and  red  striped  silk  scarf,  whose  ends,  lavishly  fringed 
with  tassels,  hung  down  between  his  shoulders  and  dallied  with 
the  wind.  From  his  neck  to  his  knees,  in  ample  folds,  a  robe 
swept  down  that  was  a  very  star-spangled  banner  of  curved 
and  sinuous  bars  of  black  and  white.  Out  of  his  back,  .some 
where,  apparently,  the  long  stem  of  a  chibouk  projected,  and 
reached  far  above  his  right  shoulder.  Athwart  his  back,  diag 
onally,  and  extending  high  above  his  left  shoulder,  was  an 
Arab  gun  of  Saladin's  lime,  that  was  splendid  with  silver 
plating  from  stock  clear  up  to  the  end  of  its  measureless 
stretch  of  barrel.  About  his  waist  was  bound  many  and  many 

366 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  367 

a  yard  of  elaborately  figured  but  sadly  tarnished  stuff  that  came 
from  sumptuous  Persia,  and  among  the  baggy  folds  in  front 
the  sunbeams  glinted  from  a  formidable  battery  of  old  brass- 
mounted  horse-pistols  and  the  gilded  hilts  of  bloodthirsty 
knives.  There  were  holsters  for  more  pistols  appended  to 
the  wonderful  stack  of  long-haired  goatskins  and  Persian 
carpets,  which  the  man  had  been  taught  to  regard  in  the  light 
of  a  saddle;  and  down  among  the  pendulous  rank  of  vast  tassels 
that  swung  from  that  saddle,  and  clanging  against  the  iron 
shovel  of  a  stirrup  that  propped  the  warrior's  knees  up 
toward  his  chin,  was  a  crooked,  silver-clad  simitar  of  such 
awful  dimensions  and  such  implacable  expression  that  no  man 
might  hope  to  look  upon  it  and  not  shudder.  The  fringed  and 
bedizened  prince  whose  privilege  it  is  to  ride  the  pony  and 
lead  the  elephant  into  a  country  village  is  poor  and  naked 
compared  to  this  chaos  of  paraphernalia,  and  the  happy  vanity 
of  the  one  is  the  very  poverty  of  satisfaction  compared  to 
the  majestic  serenity,  the  overwhelming  complacency  of  the 
other. 

'Who  is  this?  What  is  this?'*  That  was  the  trembling 
inquiry  all  down  the  line. 

"Our  guard !  From  Galilee  to  the  birthplace  of  the  Saviour, 
the  country  is  infested  with  fierce  Bedouins,  whose  sole  hap 
piness  it  is,  in  this  life,  to  cut  and  stab  and  mangle  and  murder 
unoffending  Christians.  Allah  be  with  us !" 

"Then  hire  a  regiment!  Would  you  send  us  out  among 
these  desperate  hordes,  with  no  salvation  in  our  utmost  need 
but  this  old  turret  ?" 

The  dragoman  laughed — not  at  the  facetiousness  of  the 
simile,  for  verily,  that  guide  or  that  courier  or  that  drago 
man  never  yet  lived  upon  earth  who  had  in  him  the  faintest 
appreciation  of  a  joke,  even  though  that  joke  were  so  broad 
and  so  ponderous  that  if  it  fell  on  him  it  would  flatten  him 
out  like  a  postage-stamp — the  dragoman  laughed,  and  then, 
emboldened  by  some  thought  that  was  in  his  brain,  no  doubt, 
proceeded  to  extremities  and  winked. 

In  straits  like  these,  when  a  man  laughs,  it  is  encouraging; 
when  he  winks,  it  is  positively  reassuring.  He  finally  in 
timated  that  one  guard  would  be  sufficient  to  protect  us,  but 
that  that  one  was  an  absolute  necessity.  It  was  because  of 
the  moral  weight  his  awful  panoply  would  have  with  the 
Bedouins.  Then  I  said  we  didn't  want  any  guard  at  all.  If 
one  fantastic  vagabond  could  protect  eight  armed  Christians 


368  MARK  TWAIN 

and  a  pack  of  Arab  servants  from  all  harm,  surely  that  de 
tachment  could  protect  themselves.  He  shook  his  head  doubt 
fully.  Then  I  said,  just  think  of  how  it  looks — think  of  how 
it  would  read,  to  self-reliant  Americans,  that  we  went  sneaking 
through  this  deserted  wilderness  under  the  protection  of  this 
masquerading  Arab,  who  would  break  his  neck  getting  out  of 
the  country  if  a  man  that  was  a  man  ever  started  after 
him.  It  was  a  mean,  low,  degrading  position.  Why  were  we 
ever  told  to  bring  navy  revolvers  with  us  if  we  had  to  be 
protected  at  last  by  this  infamous  star-spangled  scum  of  the 
desert?  These  appeals  were  vain — the  dragoman  only  smiled 
and  shook  his  head. 

I  rode  to  the  front  and  struck  up  an  acquaintance  with 
King  Solomon-in-all-his-glory,  and  got  him  to  show  me  his 
lingering  eternity  of  a  gun.  It  had  a  rusty  flintlock;  it  was 
ringed  and  barred  and  plated  with  silver  from  end  to  end, 
but  it  was  as  desperately  out  of  the  perpendicular  as  are  the 
billiard  cues  of  '49  that  one  finds  yet  in  service  in  the  ancient 
mining-camps  of  California.  The  muzzle,  was  eaten  by  the  rust 
of  centuries  into  a  ragged-filigree  work,  like  the  end  of 
a  burnt-out  stove-pipe.  I  shut  one  eye  and  peered  within — 
it  was  flaked  with  iron  rust  like  an  old  steamboat-boiler.  I 
borrowed  the  ponderous  pistols  and  snapped  them.  They  were 
rusty  inside,  too — had  not  been  loaded  for  a  generation.  I 
went  back,  full  of  encouragement,  and  reported  to  the  guide, 
and  asked  him  to  discharge  this  dismantled  fortress.  It  came 
out,  then.  This  fellow  was  a  retainer  of  the  Sheik  of  Tiberias, 
He  was  a  source  of  Government  revenue.  He  was  to  the 
Empire  of  Tiberias  what  the  customs  are  to  America.  The 
Sheik  imposed  guards  upon  travelers  and  charged  them  for  it. 
It  is  a  lucrative  source  of  emolument,  and  sometimes  brings' 
into  the  national  treasury  as  much  as  thirty-five  or  forty 
dollars  a  year. 

I  knew  the  warrior's  secret  now;  I  knew  the  hollow  vanity 
of  his  rusty  trumpery,  and  despised  his  asinine  complacency. 
[  told  on  him,  and  with  reckless  daring  the  cavalcade  rode 
straight  ahead  into  the  perilous  solitudes  of  the  desert,  and 
scorned  his  frantic  warnings  of  the  mutilation  and  death  that 
hovered  about  them  on  every  side. 

Arrived  at  an  elevation  of  twelve  hundred  feet  above  the 
lake  (I  ought  to  mention  that  the  lake  lies  six  hundred  feet 
below  the  level  of  the  Mediterranean — no  traveler  ever  neg 
lects  to  flourish  that  fragment  of  news  in  his  letters),  as  bald 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  369 

and  unthrilling  a  panorama  as  any  land  can  afford,  perhaps, 
was  spread  out  before  us.  Yet  it  was  so  crowded  with  his 
torical  interest,  that  if  all  the  pages  that  have  been  written 
about  it  were  spread  upon  its  surface,  they  would  flag  it  from 
horizon  to  horizon  like  a  pavement.  Among  the  localities 
comprised  in  this  view,  were  Mount  Hermon ;  the  hills  that 
border  Cesarea  Philippi,  Dan,  the  Sources  of  the  Jordan 
and  the  Waters  of  Merom;  Tiberias;  the  Sea  of  Galilee; 
Joseph's  Pit;  Capernaum;  Bethsaida;  the  supposed  scenes  of 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  feeding  of  the  multitudes  and 
the  miraculous  draft  of  fishes ;  the  declivity  down  which  the 
swine  ran  to  the  sea ;  the  entrance  and  the  exit  of  the  Jordan ; 
Safed,  "the  city  set  upon  a  hill,"  one  of  the  four  holy  cities 
of  the  Jews,  and  the  place  where  they  believe  the  real  Messiah 
will  appear  when  he  comes  to  redeem  the  world;  part  of  the 
battle-field  of  Hattin,  where  the  knightly  Crusaders  fought 
their  last  fight,  and  in  a  blaze  of  glory  passed  from  the  stage 
and  ended  their  splendid  career  forever;  Mount  Tabor,  the 
traditional  scene  of  the  Lord's  Transfiguration.  And  down 
toward  the  southeast  lay  a  landscape  that  suggested  to  my  mind 
a  quotation  (imperfectly  remembered,  no  doubt)  : 

The  Ephraimites,  not  being  called  upon  to  share  in  the  rich  spoils 
of  the  Ammonitish  war,  assembled  a  mighty  host  to  fight  against 
Jeptha,  Judge  of  Israel ;  who  being  appraised  of  their  approach, 
gathered  together  the  men  of  Israel  and  gave  them  battle  and  put  them 
to  flight.  To  make  his  victory  the  more  secure,  he  stationed  guards 
at  the  different  fords  and  passages  of  the  Jordan,  with  instructions 
to  let  none  pass  who  could  not  say  Shibboleth.  The  Ephraimites, 
being  of  a  different  tribe,  could  not  frame  to  pronounce  the  word 
aright,  but  called  it  Sibboleth,  which  proved  them  enemies  and  cost  them 
their  lives ;  wherefore  forty  and  two  thousand  fell  at  the  different 
fords  and  passages  of  the  Jordan  that  day. 

We  jogged  along  peacefully  over  the  great  caravan  route 
from  Damascus  to  Jerusalem  and  Egypt,  past  Lubia  and  other 
Syrian  hamlets,  perched  in  the  unvarying  style,  upon  the  sum 
mit  of  steep  mounds  and  hills,  and  fenced  round  about  with 
giant  cactuses  (the  sign  of  worthless  land),  with  prickly 
pears  upon  them  like  hams,  and  came  at  last  to  the  battle-field 
of  Hattin. 

It  is  a  grand,  irregular  plateau,  and  looks  as  if  it  might  have 
been  created  for  a  battle-field.  Here  the  peerless  Saladin  met 
the  Christian  host  some  seven  hundred  years  ago,  and  broke 
their  power  in  Palestine  for  all  time  to  come.  There  had  long 


370  MARK  TWAIN 

been  a  truce  between  the  opposing  forces,  but  according  to 
the  Guide-Book,  Raynauld  of  Chatillon,  Lord  of  Kerak,  broke 
it  by  plundering  a  Damascus  caravan,  and  refusing  to  give  up 
either  the  merchants  or  their  goods  when  Saladin  demanded 
them.  This  conduct  of  an  insolent  petty  chieftain  stung  the 
Sultan  to  the  quick,  and  he  swore  that  he  would  slaughter 
.Raynauld  with  his  own  hand,  no  matter  how,  or  when,  or 
where  he  found  him.  Both  armies  prepared  for  war.  Under 
the  weak  King  of  Jerusalem  was  the  very  flower  of  the 
Christian  chivalry.  He  foolishly  compelled  them  to  undergo 
a  long,  exhausting  march,  in  the  scorching  sun,  and  then,  with 
out  water  or  other  refreshment,  ordered  them  to  encamp  in 
this  open  plain.  The  splendidly  mounted  masses  of  Moslem 
soldiers  swept  round  the  north  end  of  Gennesaret,  burning 
and  destroying  as  they  came,  and  pitched  their  camp  in  front 
of  the  opposing  lines.  At  dawn  the  terrific  fight  began.  Sur 
rounded  on  all  sides  by  the  Sultan's  swarming  battalions,  the 
Christian  Knights  fought  on  without  a  hope  for  their  lives. 
They  fought  with  desperate  valor,  but  to  no  purpose ;  the  odds 
of  heat  and  numbers  and  consuming  thirst  were  too  great 
against  them.  Toward  the  middle  of  the  day  the  bravest  of 
their  band  cut  their  way  through  the  Moslem  ranks  and  gained 
the  summit  of  a  little  hill,  and  there,  hour  after  hour,  they 
closed  around  the  banner  of  the  Cross,  and  beat  back  the  charg 
ing  squadrons  of  the  enemy. 

But  the  doom  of  the  Christian  power  was  sealed.  Sunset 
found  Saladin  Lord  of  Palestine,  the  Christian  chivalry 
strewn  in  heaps  upon  the  field,  and  the  King  of  Jerusalem,  the 
Grand  Master  of  the  Templars,  and  Raynauld  of  Chatillon, 
captives  in  the  Sultan's  tent.  Saladin  treated  two  of  the 
prisoners  with  princely  courtesy,  and  ordered  refreshments 
to  be  set  before  them.  When  the  King  handed  an  iced  sherbet 
to  Chatillon,  the  Sultan  said,  "It  is  thou  that  givest  it  ta  him, 
not^  I."  He  remembered  his  oath,  and  slaughtered  the  hapless 
Knight  of  Chatillon  with  his  own  hand. 

It  was  hard  to  realize  that  this  silent  plain  had  once  re 
sounded  with  martial  music  and  trembled  to  the  tramp  of 
armed  men.  It  was  hard  to  people  this  solitude  with  rushing 
columns  of  cavalry,  and  stir  its  torpid  pulses  with  the  shouts 
of  victors,  the  shrieks  of  the  wounded,  and  the  flash  of  banner 
and  steel  above  the  surging  billows  of  war.  A  desolation  is 
here  that  not  even  imagination  can  grace  with  the  pomp  of  life 
and  action. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  371 

We  reached  Tabor  safely,  and  considerably  in  advance  of 
that  old  iron-clad  swindle  of  a  guard.  We  never  saw  a  human 
being  on  the  whole  route,  much  less  lawless  hordes  of 
Bedouins.  Tabor  stands  solitary  and  alone,  a  giant  sentinel 
above  the  Plain  of  Esdraelon.  It  rises  some  fourteen  hundred 
feet  above  the  surrounding  level,  a  green,  wooded  cone,  symmet 
rical  and  full  of  grace — a  prominent  landmark,  and  one 
that  is  exceedingly  pleasant  to  eyes  surfeited  with  the  repulsive 
monotony  of  desert  Syria.  We  climbed  the  steep  path  to  its 
summit,  through  breezy  glades  of  thorn  and  oak.  The  view 
presented  from  its  highest  peak  was  almost  beautiful.  Be 
low,  was  the  broad,  level  plain  of  Esdraelon,  checkered  with 
fields  like  a  chess-board,  and  full  as  smooth  and  level,  seem 
ingly  ;  dotted  about  its  borders  with  white,  compact  villages, 
and  faintly  penciled,  far  and  near,  with  the  curving  lines  of 
roads  and  trails.  When  it  is  robed  in  the  fresh  verdure  of 
spring,  it  must  form  a  charming  picture,  even  by  itself.  Skirt 
ing  its  southern  border  rises  "Little  Hermon,"  over  whose 
summit  a  glimpse  of  Gilboa  is  caught.  Nain,  famous  for  the 
raising  of  the  widow's  son,  and  Endor,  as  famous  for  the 
performances  of  her  witch,  are  in  view.  To  the  eastward 
lies  the  Valley  of  the  Jordan  and  beyond  it  the  mountains  of 
Gilead.  Wesward  is  Mount  Carmel.  Hermon  in  the 
north — the  table-lands  of  Bashan — Safed,  the  holy  city,  gleam 
ing  white  upon  a  tall  spur  of  the  mountains  of  Lebanon — a 
steel-blue  corner  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee — saddle-peaked  Hattin, 
traditional  "Mount  of  Beatitudes"  and  mute  witness  of  the 
last  brave  fight  of  the  Crusading  host  for  Holy  Cross — these 
fill  up  the  picture. 

To  glance  at  the  salient  features  of  this  landscape  through 
the  picturesque  framework  of  a  ragged  and  ruined  stone  win 
dow-arch  of  the  time  of  Christ,  thus  hiding  from  sight  all  that 
is  unattractive,  is  to  secure  to  yourself  a  pleasure  worth 
climbing  the  mountain  to  enjoy.  One  must  stand  on  his 
head  to  get  the  best  effect  in  a  fine  sunset,  and  set  a  land 
scape  in  a  bold,  strong  framework  that  is  very  close  at 
hand,  to  bring  out  all  its  beauty.  One  learns  this  latter  truth 
never  more  to  forget  it,  in  that  mimic  land  of  enchantment, 
the  wonderful  garden  of  my  lord  the  Count  Pallavicini,  near 
Genoa.  You  go  wandering  for  hours  among  hills  and  wooded 
glens,  artfully  contrived  to  leave  the  impression  that  Nature 
shaped  them  and  not  man;  following  winding  paths  and  com 
ing  suddenly  upon  leaping  cascades  and  rustic  bridges ;  finding 


372  MARK  TWAIN 

sylvan  lakes  where  you  expected  them  not;  loitering  through 
battered  medieval  castle  in  miniature  that  seem  hoary 
with  age  and  yet  were  built  a  dozen  years  ago ;  meditating  over 
ancient  crumbling  tombs,  whose  marble  columns  were  marred 
and  broken  purposely  by  the  modern  artist  that  made  them; 
stumbling  unawares  "upon  toy  palaces,  wrought  of  rare  and 
costly  materials,  and  again  upon  a  peasant's  hut,  whose  dilap 
idated  furniture  would  never  suggest  that  it  was  made  so  to 
order;  sweeping  round  and  round  in  the  midst  of  a  forest 
on  an  enchanted  wooden  horse  that  is  moved  by  some  in 
visible  agency;  traversing  Roman  roads  and  passing  under 
majestic  triumphal  arches;  resting  in  quaint  bowers  where 
unseen  spirits  discharge  jets  of  water  on  you  from  every 
possible  direction,  and  where  even  the  flowers  you  touch  assail 
you  with  a  shower;  boating  on  a  subterranean  lake  among 
caverns  and  arches  royally  draped  with  clustering  stalactites, 
and  passing  out  into  open  day  upon  another  lake,  which  is 
bordered  with  sloping  banks  of  grass  and  gay  with  patrician 
barges  that  swim  at  anchor  in  the  shadow  of  a  miniature 
marble  temple  that  rises  out  of  the  clear  water  and  glasses 
its  white  statues,  its  rich  capitals  and  fluted  columns  in  the 
tranquil  depths.  So,  from  marvel  to  marvel  you  have  drifted 
on,  thinking  all  the  time  that  the  one  last  seen  must  be 
the  chiefest.  And,  verily,  the  chiefest  wonder  is  reserved  until 
the  last,  but  you  do  not  see  it  until  you  step  ashore,  and  passing 
through  a  wilderness  of  rare  flowers,  collected  from  every 
corner  of  the  earth,  you  stand  at  the  door  of  one  more  mimic 
temple.  Right  in  this  place  the  artist  taxed  his  genius  to  the 
utmost,  and  fairly  opened  the  gates  of  fairy-land.  You  lock 
through  an  unpretending  pane  of  glass,  stained  yellow;  thf 
first  thing  you  see  is  a  mass  of  quivering  foliage,  ten  shoii 
steps  before  you,  in  the  midst  of  which  is  a  ragged  ripening 
like  a  gateway — a  thing  that  is  common  enough  in  nature, 
and  not  apt  to  excite  suspicions  of  a  deep  human  design — and 
above  the  bottom  of  the  gateway,  project,  in  the  most  careless 
way,  a  few  broad  tropic  leaves  and  brilliant  flowers.  All  of  a 
sudden,  through  this  bright,  bold  gateway,  you  catch  a  glimpse 
of  the  faintest,  softest,  richest  picture  that  ever  graced  the 
dream  of  a  dying  Saint,  since  John  saw  the  New  Jerusalem 
glimmering  above  the  clouds  of  Heaven.  A  broad  sweep  of 
sea,  flecked  with  careening  sails;  a  sharp,  jutting  cape,  and  a 
lofty  lighthouse  on  it;  a  sloping  lawn  behind  it;  beyond,  a 
portion  of  the  old  "city  of  palaces,"  with  its  parks  and  hills 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  373 

and  stately  mansions;  beyond  these,  a  prodigious  mountain, 
with  its  strong  outlines  sharply  cut  against  ocean  and  sky;  and, 
over  all,  vagrant  shreds  and  flakes  of  cloud,  floating  in  a 
sea  of  gold.  The  ocean  is  gold,  the  city  is  gold,  the  meadow, 
the  mountain,  the  sky — everything  is  golden — rich,  and  mellow, 
and  dreamy  as  a  vision  of  Paradise.  No  artist  could  put  upon 
canvas  its  entrancing  beauty,  and  yet,  without  the  yellow  glass, 
and  the  carefully  contrived  accident  of  a  framework  that  cast 
it  into  enchanted  distance  and  shut  out  from  it  all  unattractive 
features,  it  was  not  a  picture  to  fall  into  ecstasies  over.  Such 
is  life,  and  the  trail  of  the  serpent  is  over  us  all. 

There  is  nothing  for  it  now  but  to  come  back  to  old 
Tabor,  though  the  subject  is  tiresome  enough,  and  I  cannot 
stick  to  it  for  wandering  off  to  scenes  that  are  pleasanter  to 
remember.  I  think  I  will  skip,  anyhow.  (There  is  nothing  \ 
about  Tabor  (except  we  concede  that  it  was  the  scene  of  the 
Transfiguration),  but  .some  gray  old  ruins,  stacked  up  there 
in  all  ages  of  the  world  from  the  days  of  stout  Gideon  and 
parties  that  flourished  thirty  centuries  ago  to  the  fresh  yester 
day  of  Crusading  times.  It  has  its  Greek  Convent,  and  the 
coffee  there  is  good,  but  never  a  splinter  of  the  true  cross  or 
bone  of  a  hallowed  saint  to  arrest  the  idle  thoughts  of  world 
lings  and  turn  them  into  graver  channelsT)  A  Catholic  church 
is  nothing  to  me  that  has  no  relics. 

The  plain  of  Esdraelon — "the  battle-field  of  the  nations" 
— only  sets  one  to  dreaming  of  Joshua,  and  Benhadad,  and 
Saul,  and  Gideon;  Tamerlane,  Tancred,  Coeur  de  Lion,  and 
Saladin ;  the  warrior  Kings  of  Persia,  Egypt's  heroes,  and 
Napoleon — for  they  all  fought  here.  If  the  magic  of  the 
moonlight  could  summon  from  the  graves  of  forgotten  cen 
turies  and  many  lands  the  countless  myriads  that  have  battled 
on  this  wide,  far-reaching  floor,  and  array  them  in  the  thou 
sand  strange  costumes  of  their  hundred  nationalities,  and  send 
the  vast  host  sweeping  down  the  plain,  splendid  with  plumes 
and  banners  and  glittering  lances,  I  could  stay  here  an  age 
to  see  the  phantom  pageant.  But  the  magic  of  the  moonlight 
is  a  vanity  and  a  fraud  and  who  so  putteth  his  trust  in  it 
shall  suffer  sorrow  and  disappointment. 

Down  at  the  foot  of  Tabor,  and  just  at  the  edge  of  the 
storied  Plain  of  Esdraleon,  is  the  insignificant  village  of 
Deburieh,  where  Deborah,  prophetess  of  Israel,  lived.  It  is 
just  like  Magdala. 


CHAPTER  L 

WE  descended  from  Mount  Tabor,  crossed  a  deep  ravine, 
and  followed  a  hilly,  rocky  road  to  Nazareth— distant 
two  hours.  All  distances  in  the  East  are  measured 
by  hours,  not  miles.  A  good  horse  will  walk  three  miles  an 
hour  over  nearly  any  kind  of  a  road ;  therefore,  an  hour  here 
always  stands  for  three  miles.  This  method  of  computation 
is  bothersome  and  annoying;  and  until  one  gets  thoroughly 
accustomed  to  it,  it  carries  no  intelligence  to  his  mind  until 
he  has  stopped  and  translated  the  pagan  hours  into  Christian 
miles,  just  as  people  do  with  the  spoken  words  of  a  foreign 
language  they  are  acquainted  with,  but  not  familiarly  enough 
to  catch  the^  meaning  in  a  moment.  Distances  traveled  by 
human  feet  are  also  estimated  by  hours  and  minutes,  though  1 
do  not  know  what  the  base  of  the  calculation  is.  In  Constan 
tinople  you  ask,  "How  far  is  it  to  the  Consulate?"  and  they 
answer,  "About  ten  minutes."  "How  far  is  it  to  the  Lloyds' 
Agency?"  "Quarter  of  an  hour."  "How  far  is  it  to  the 
lower  bridge?"  "Four  minutes."  I  cannot  be  positive  about 
it,  but  I  think  that  there,  when  a  man  orders  a  pair  of  panta 
loons,  he  says  he  wants  them  a  quarter  of  a  minute  in  the  legs 
and  nine  seconds  around  the  waist. 

Two  hours  from  Tabor  to  Nazareth — and  as  it  was  an  un 
commonly  narrow,  crooked  trail,  we  necessarily  met  all  the 
camel-trains  and  jackass-caravans  between  Jericho  and  Jack 
sonville  in  that  particular  place  and  nowhere  else.  The  don 
keys  do  not  matter  so  much,  because  they  are  so  smaH  that 
you  can  jump  your  horse  over  them  if  he  is  an  animal  of  spirit, 
but  a  camel  is  not  jumpable.  A  camel  is  as  tall  as  any  ordinary 
dwelling-house  in  Syria — which  is  to  say  a  camel  is  from 
one  to  two,  and  sometimes  nearly  three  feet  taller  than  a  good- 
sized  man.  In  this  part  of  the  country  his  load  is  oftenest  in 
the  shape  of  colossal  sacks — one  on  each  side.  He  and  his 
cargo  take  up  as  much  room  as  a  carriage.  Think  of  meeting 
this  style  of  obstruction 'in  a  narrow  trail.  The  camel  would 
not  turn  out  for  a  king.  He  stalks  serenely  along,  bringing 
his  cushioned  stilts  forward  with  the  long,  regular  swing  of 

374 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  375 

a  pendulum,  and  whatever  is  in  the  way  must  get  out  of  the 
way  peaceably,  or  be  wiped  out  forcibly  by  the  bulky  sacks. 
It  was  a  tiresome  ride  to  us,  and  perfectly  exhausting  to  the 
horses.  We  were  compelled  to  jump  over  upward  of  eighteen 
hundred  donkeys,  and  only  one  person  in  the  party  was  un 
seated  less  than  sixty  times  by  the  camels.  This  seems  like 
a  powerful  statement,  but  the  poet  has  said,  "Things  are  not 
what  they  seem."  I  cannot  think  of  anything  now  more  cer 
tain  to  make  one  shudder,  than  to  have  a  soft-footed  camel 
sneak  up  behind  him  and  touch  him  on  the  ear  with  its  cold, 
flabby  under-lip.  A  camel  did  this  for  one  of  the  boys,  who 
was  dropping  over  his  saddle  in  a  brown-study.  He  glanced 
up  and  saw  the  majestic  apparition  hovering  above  him,  and 
made  frantic  efforts  to  get  out  of  the  way,  but  the  camel 
reached  out  and  bit  him  on  the  shoulder  before  he  accomplished 
it.  This  was  the  only  pleasant  incident  of  the  journey. 

At  Nazareth  we  camped  in  an  olive  grove  near  the  Virgin 
Mary's  fountain,  and  that  wonderful  Arab  "guard"  came  to 
collect  some  bucksheesh  for  his  "services"  in  following  us  from 
Tiberias  and  warding  off  invisible  dangers  with  the  terrors  of 
his  armament.  The  dragoman  had  paid  his  master,  but  that 
counted  as  nothing — if  you  hire  a  man  to  sneeze  for  you  here, 
and  another  man  chooses  to  help  him,  you  have  got  to  pay 
both.  They  do  nothing  whatever  without  pay.  How  it  must 
have  surprised  these  people  to  hear  the  way  of  salvation  offered 
to  them  "without  money  and  without  price."  If  the  manners, 
the  people,  or  the  customs  of  this  country  have  changed  since 
the  Saviour's  time,  the  figures  and  metaphors  of  the  Bible  are 
not  the  evidences  to  prove  it  by. 

We  entered  the  great  Latin  Convent  which  is  built  over  the 
traditional  dwelling-place  of  the  Holy  Family.  We  went  down 
a  flight  of  fifteen  steps  below  the  ground-level,  and  stood  in 
a  small  chapel  tricked  out  with  tapestry  hangings,  silver  lamps, 
and  oil-paintings.  ££  spot  marked  by  a  cross,  in  the  marble  » 
floor,  under  the  altaVTwas  exhibited  as  the  place  made  forever 
holy  by  the  feet  of  the  Virgin  when  she  stood  up  to  receive  the 
message  of  the  angel.  So  simple,  so  unpretending  a  locality, 
to  be  the  scene  of  so  mighty  an  event!  The  very  scene  of  the 
Annunciation — an  event  which  has  been  commemorated  by 
splendid  shrines  and  august  temples  all  over  the  civilized  world, 
and  one  which  the  princes  of  art  have  made  it  their  loftiest 
ambition  to  picture  worthily  on  their  canvas;  a  spot  whose 
history  is  familiar  to  the  very  children  of  every  house,  and  city, 


376  MARK  TWAIN 

•  and  obscure  hamlet  of  the  furthest  lands  of  Christendom ;  a 
spot  which  myriads  of  men  would  toil  across  the  breadth  of 
a  world  to  see,  would  consider  it  a  priceless  privilege  to  look 


upon.     It  was  easy  to  think  these  thoughts.     But  it  was  not 
easy  to  bring  myself  up  to  the  magnitude  of  ^  the  situation,     I 


V^etOV          C\_/         *-"•  AA.*.^        *         J  A 

could  sit  off  several  thousand  miles  and  imagine  the  angel  ap 
pearing,  with  shadowy  wings  and  lustrous  countenance,  and 
note  the  glory  that  streamed  downward  upon  the  Virgin's  head 
while  the  message  from  the  Throne  of  God  fell  upon  her  ears 
— any  one  can  do  that,  beyond  the  ocean,  but  few  can  do  it 
here^?  I  saw  the  little  recess  from  which  the  angel  stepped,  but 
could  not  fill  its  void.  The  angels  that  I  know  are  creatures 
of  unstable  fancy — they  will  not  fit  in  niches  of  substantial 
stone.  Imagination  labors  best  in  distant  fields.  I  doubt  if 
any  man  can  stand  in  the  Grotto  of  the  Annunciation  and 
people  with  the  phantom  images  of  his  mind  its  too  tangible 
walls  of  stone. 

They  showed  us  a  broken  granite  pillar,  depending  from  the 
roof,  which  they  said  was  hacked  in  two  by  the  Moslem  con 
querors  of  Nazareth,  in  the  vain  hope  of  pulling  down  the 
sanctuary.  But  the  pillar  remained  miraculously  suspended 
in  the  air,  and,  unsupported  itself,  supported  then  and  still 
supports  the  roof.  By  dividing  this  statement  up  among 
eight,  it  was  found  not  difficult  to  believe  it. 

These  gifted  Latin  monks  never  do  anything  by  halves. 
If  they  were  to  show  you  the  Brazen  Serpent  that  was  elevated 
in  the  wilderness,  you  could  depend  upon  it  that  they  had  on 
hand  the  pole  it  was  elevated  on  also,  and  even  the  hole  it  stood 
in.  They  have  got  the  "Grotto"  of  the  Annunciation  here ;  and 
just  as  convenient  to  it  as  one's  throat  is  to  his  mouth,  they  have 
also  the  Virgin's  Kitchen,  and  even  her  sitting-room,  where; 
she  and  Joseph  watched  the  infant  Saviour  play  with  Hebrew 
toys  eighteen  hundred  years  ago.  All  under  one  roof,  and  all 
clean,  spacious,  comfortable  "grottoes."  It  seems  curious  that 
personages  intimately  connected  with  the  Holy  Family  always 
lived  in  grottoes — in  Nazareth,  in  Bethlehem,  in  imperial  Ephe- 
sus — and  yet  nobody  else  in  their  day  and  generation  thought 
of  doing  anything  of  the  kind.  If  they  ever  did,  their  grot 
toes  are  all  gone,  and  I  suppose  we  ought  to  wonder  at  the 
peculiar  marvel  of  the  preservation  of  these  I  speak  of.  When 
the  Virgin  fled  from  Herod's  wrath,  she  hid  in  a  grotto  in 
Bethlehem,  and  the  same  is  there  to  this  day.  The  slaughter 
of  the  innocents  in  Bethlehem  was  done  in  a  grotto ;  the  Savi- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  377 

)ur  was  born  in  a  grotto — both  are  shown  to  pilgrims  yet. 
t   is   exceedingly   strange   that   these   tremendous   events   all 
lappened    in    grottoes — and    exceedingly    fortunate,    likewise 
>ecause  the  strongest  houses  must  crumble  to  ruin  in  time,  but 
i  grotto  in  the  living  rock  will  last  forever.    It  is  an  imposture 
—this  grotto  stuff — but  it  is  one  that  all  men  ought  to  thank 
.he  Catholics   for.     Wherever  they   ferret  out  a  lost  locality 
iiade  holy  by  some   Scriptural  event,  they  straightway  build 
i  massive — almost   imperishable — church  there,   and   preserve 
;he  memory  of   that  locality   for   the  gratification   of    future 
generations.    If  it  had  been  left  to  Protestants  to  do  this  most 
worthy  work,  we  would  not  even  know  where  Jerusalem  is 
:o-day,   and   the   man   who   could   go   and   put   his   finger  on 
Nazareth  would  be  too  wise  for  this  world.     The  world  owes 
i;he  Catholics  its  good  will  even  for  the  happy  rascality  of  hew- 
ng  out  these  bogus  grottoes  in  the  rock;   for  it  is  infinitely 
.nore  satisfactory  to  look  at  a  grotto,  where  people  have  faith- 
:  fully  believed  for  centuries  that  the  Virgin  once  lived,  than 
!:o  have  to  imagine  a  dwelling-place  for  her  somewhere,  any 
where,   nowhere,   loose   and   at   large   all   over   this   town   of 
Nazareth.     There  is  too  large  a  scope  of  country.     The  im- 
;  agination  cannot  work.    There  is  no  one  particular  spot  to  chain 
your  eye,  rivet  your  interest,  and  make  you  think.    The  mem 
ory  of  the  Pilgrims  cannot  perish  while  Plymouth  Rock  re- 
!  trains  to  us,     The  old  monks  are  wise.     They  know  how  to 
ilrive  a  stake  through  a  pleasant  tradition  that  will  hold  it  to 
:ts  place  forever. 

We  visited  the  places  where  Jesus  worked  for  fifteen  years 
fis  a  carpenter,  and  where  he  attempted  to  teach  in  the  syn 
agogue  and  was  driven  out  by  a  mob.  Catholic  chapels  stand 
upon  these  sites  and  protect  the  little  fragments  of  the  ancient 
walls  which  remain.  Our  pilgrims  broke  off  specimens.  We 
visited,  also,  a  new  chapel,  in  the  midst  of  the  town,  which  is 
built  around  a  boulder  some  twelve  feet  long  by  four  feet 
thick;  the  priests  discovered,  a  few  years  ago,  that  the  dis 
ciples  had  sat  upon  this  rock  to  rest  once,  when  they  had 
walked  up  from  Capernaum.  They  hastened  to  preserve  the 
relic.  Relics  are  very  good  property.  Travelers  are  expected 
to  pay  for  seeing  them,  and  they  do  it  cheerfully.  We  like  the 
idea.  One's  conscience  can  never  be  the  worse  for  the  knowl 
edge  that  he  has  paid  his  way  like  a  man.  Our  pilgrims  would 
have  liked  very  well  to  get  out  their  lampblack  and  stencil- 
plates  and  paint  their  names  on  that  rock,  together  with  the 


378  MARK  TWAIN 

names  of  the  villages  they  hail  from  in  America,  but  the  priests 
permit  nothing  of  that  kind.  To  speak  the  strict  truth,  how 
ever,  our  party  seldom  offend  in  that  way,  though  we  have 
men  in  the  ship  who  never  lose  an  opportunity  to  do  it.  Our 
pilgrims'  chief  sin  is  their  lust  for  "specimens."  I  suppose  that 
by  this  time  they  know  the  dimensions  of  that  rock  to  an  inch, 
and  its  weight  to  a  ton;  and  I  do  not  hesitate  to  charge  that 
they  will  go  back  there  to-night  and  try  to  carry  it  off. 

This  "Fountain  of  the  Virgin"  is  the  one  which  tradition 
says  Mary  used  to  get  water  from,  twenty  times  a  day,  when 
she  was  a  girl,  and  bear  it  away  in  a  jar  upon  her  head.  The 
water  streams  through  faucets  in  the  face  of  a  wall  of  ancient 
masonry  which  stands  removed  from  the  houses  of  the  village. 
The  young  girls  of  Nazareth  still  collect  about  it  by  the  dozen 
and  keep  up  a  riotous  laughter  and  sky-larking.  The  Nazarene 
girls  are  homely.  Some  of  them  have  large,  lustrous  eyes, 
but  none  of  them  have  pretty  faces.  These  girls  wear  a  single 
garment,  usually,  and  it  is  loose,  shapeless,  of  undecided  color ; 
it  is  generally  out  of  repair,  too.  They  wear,  from  crown  to 
jaw,  curious  strings  of  old  coins,  after  the  manner  of  the  belles 
of  Tiberias,  and  brass  jewelry  upon  their  wrists  and  in  their 
ears.  They  wear  no  shoes  and  stockings.  They  are  the  most 
human  girls  we  have  found  in  the  country  yet,  and  the  best 
natured.  But  there  is  no  question  that  these  picturesque 
maidens  sadly  lack  comeliness. 

A  pilgrim— the  "Enthusiast"— said :  "See  that  tall,  grace 
ful  girl !  look  at  the  Madonna-like  beauty  of  her  countenance !" 

Another  pilgrim  came  along  presently  and  said:  "Observe 
that  tall,  graceful  girl;  what  queenly  Madonna-like  graceful 
ness  of  beauty  is  in  her  countenance." 

I  said:  "She  is  not  tall,  she  is  short;  she  is  not  beautiful; 
she  is  homely;  she  is  graceful  enough,  I  grant,  but  she  is 
rather  boisterous." 

The  third  and  last  pilgrim  moved  by,  before  long,  and  he 
said:  "Ah,  what  a  tall,  graceful  girl!  what  Madonna-like 
gracefulness  of  queenly  beauty!" 

The  verdicts  were  all  in.  It  was  time,  now,  to  look  up  the 
authorities  for  all  these  opinions.  I  found  this  paragraph,. 
which  follows.  Written  by  whom?  Wm.  C.  Grimes: 

After  we  were  in  the  saddle,  we  rode  down  to  the  spring  to  have 
i  last  look  at  the  women  of  Nazareth,  who  were,  as  a  class,  much  the 
prettiest  that  we  had  seen  in  the  East.  As  we  approached  the  crowd 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  379 

a  tall  girl  of  nineteen  advanced  toward  Miriam  and  offered  her  a 
cup  of  water.  Her  movement  was  graceful  and  queenly.  We  ex 
claimed  on  the  spot  at  the  Madonna-like  beauty  of  her  countenance. 
Whitely  was  suddenly  thirsty,  and  begged  for  water,  and  drank  it 
slowly,  with  his  eyes  over  the  top  of  the  cup,  fixed  on  her  large  black 
eyes,  which  gazed  on  him  quite  as  curiously  as  he  on  her.  Then 
Moreright  wanted  water.  She  gave  it  to  him  and  he  managed  to  spill 
it  so  as  to  ask  for  another  cup,  and  by  the  time  she  came  to  me  she 
saw  through  the  operation;  her  eyes  were  full  of  fun  as  she  looked 
at  me.  I  laughed  outright,  and  she  joined  me  in  as  gay  a  shout  as 
ever  country  maiden  in  old  Orange  County.  I  wished  for  a  picture  of 
her.  A  Madonna,  whose  face  was  a  portrait  of  that  beautiful  Nazareth 
girl,  would  be  a  "thing  of  beauty"  and  "a  joy  forever." 

That  is  the  kind  of  gruel  which  has  been  served  out  from 
Palestine  for  ages.  Commend  me  to  Fenimore  Cooper  to  find 
beauty  in  the  Indians,  and  to  Grimes  to  find  it  in  the  Arabs. 
Arab  men  are  often  fine-looking,  but  Arab  women  are  not. 
We  can  all  believe  that  the  Virgin  Mary  was  beautiful;  it  is 
not  natural  to  think  otherwise ;  but  does  it  follow  that  it  is  our 
duty  to  find  beauty  in  these  present  women  of  Nazareth? 

I  love  to  quote  from  Grimes,  because  he  is  so  dramatic. 
And  because  he  is  so  romantic.  And  because  he  seems  to  care 
but  little  whether  he  tells  the  truth  or  not,  so  he  scares  the 
reader  or  excites  his  envy  or  his  admiration. 

He  went  through  this  peaceful  land  with  one  hand  forever 
on  his  revolver,  and  the  other  on  his  pocket-handkerchief. 
Always,  when  he  was  not  on  the  point  of  crying  over  a  holy 
place,  he  was  on  the  point  of  killing  an  Arab.  More  surprising 
things  happened  to  him  in  Palestine  than  ever  happened  to  any 
traveler  here  or  elsewhere  since  Munchausen  died. 

At  Beit  Jin,  where  nobody  had  interfered  with  him,  he  crept 
out  of  his  tent  at  dead  of  night  and  shot  at  what  he  took  to  be 
an  Arab  lying  on  a  rock,  some  distance  away,  planning  evil. 
The  ball  killed  a  wolf.  Just  before  he  fired,  he  makes  a  dra 
matic  picture  of  himself — as  usual,  to  scare  the  reader: 

Was  it  imagination,  or  did  I  see  a  moving  object  on  the  surface 
of  the  rock?  If  it  were  a  man,  why  did  he  not  now  drop  me?  He 
had  a  beautiful  shot  as  I  stood  out  in  my  black  burnoose  against  the 
white  tent.  I  had  the  sensation  of  an  entering  bullet  in  my  throat, 
breast,  brain. 

Reckless  creature! 

Riding  toward   Gennesaret,   they   saw   two   Bedouins,   and 


380  MARK  TWAIN 

"we  looked  to  our  pistols  and  loosened  them  quietly  in  our 
shawls,"  etc.     Always  cool. 

In  Samaria,  he  charged  up  a  hill,  in  the  face  of  a  volley 
of  stones;  he  fired  into  the  crowd  of  men  who  threw  them. 
He  says: 

/  never  lost  an  opportunity  of  impressing  the  Arab  with  the  perfection 
of  American  and  English  weapons,  and  the  danger  of  attacking  any 
one  of  the  armed  Franks.  I  think  the  lesson  of  that  ball  not  lost. 

At  Beitin  he  gave  his  whole  brand  of  Arab  muleteers  a 
piece  of  his  mind,  and  then — 

I  contented  myself  with  a  solemn  assurance  that  if  there  occurred 
another  instance  of  disobedience  to  orders,  I  would  thrash  the  re 
sponsible  party  as  he  never  dreamed  of  being  thrashed,  and  if  I  could 
not  find  who  was  responsible,  I  would  whip  them  all,  from  first  to 
last,  whether  there  was  a  governor  at  hand  to  do  it  or  I  had  to 
do  it  myself. 

Perfectly  fearless,  this  man. 

He  rode  down  the  perpendicular  path  in  the  rocks,  from  the 
Castle  of  Banias  to  the  oak  grove,  at  a  flying  gallop,  his  horse 
striding  "thirty  feet"  at  every  bound.  I  stand  prepared  to 
bring  thirty  reliable  witnesses  to  prove  that  Putnam's  famous 
feat  at  Horseneck  was  insignificant  compared  to  this. 

Behold  him — always  theatrical — looking  at  Jerusalem — this 
time,  by  an  oversight,  with  his  hand  off  his  pistol  for  once. 

I  stood  in  the  road,  my  hand  on  my  horse's  neck,  and  with  my 
dim  eyes  sought  to  trace  the  outlines  of  the  holy  places  which  I  had 
long  before  fixed  in  my  mind,  but  the  fast-flowing  tears  forbade  my, 
succeeding.  There  were  our  Mohammedan  servants,  a  Latin  monk/ 
two  Armenians,  and  a  Jew  in  our  cortege,  and  all  alike  gazed  with* 
overflowing  eyes. 

If  Latin  monks  and  Arabs  cried,  I  know  to  a  moral  cer 
tainty  that  the  horses  cried  also,  and  so  the  picture  is  complete. 

But  when  necessity  demanded  he  could  be  firm  as  adamant. 
In  the  Lebanon  Valley  an  Arab  youth — a  Christian;  he  is 
particular  to  explain  that  Mohammedans  do  not  steal-— robbed 
him  of  a  paltry  ten  dollars'  worth  of  powder  and  shot.  He 
convicted  him  before  a -sheik  and  looked  on  while  he  was 
punished  by  the  terrible  bastinado.  Hear  him: 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  381 

He  ( Mousa)  was  on  his  back  in  a  twinkling,  howling,  shouting, 
screaming,  but  he  was  carried  out  to  the  piazza  before  the  door,  where 
we  could  see  the  operation,  and  laid  face  down.  One  man  sat  on  his 
back  and  one  on  his  legs,  the  latter  holding  up  his  feet,  while  a  third 
laid  on  the  bare  soles  a  rhinoceros-hide  koorbash1  that  whizzed  through 
the  air  at  every  stroke.  Poor  Moreright  was  in  agony,  and  Nama  and 
Nama  the  Second  (mother  and  sister  of  Mousa)  were  on  their  faces 
begging  and  wailing,  now  embracing  my  legs,  now  Whitely's,  while 
the  brother,  outside,  made  the  air  ring  with  cries  louder  than  Mousa's. 
Even  Yusef  came  and  asked  me  on  his  knees  to  relent,  and  last  of  all 
Betuni — the  rascal  had  lost  a  feed-bag  in  their  house  and  had  been 
loudest  in  his  denunciations  that  morning — besought  the  Howajji  to 
have  mercy  on  the  fellow. 

But  not  he!  The  punishment  was  "suspended,"  at  the 
fifteenth  blow,  to  hear  the  confession.  Then  Grimes  and  his 
party  rode  away,  and  left  the  entire  Christian  family  to  be 
fined  and  as  severely  punished  as  the  Mohammedan  sheik 
should  deem  proper. 

As   I  mounted,   Yusef  once  more  begged  me  to  interfere  and  have 

mercy  on  them,  but  I  looked  around  at  the  dark  faces  of  the  crowd, 
and  I  couldn't  find  one  drop  of  pity  in  my  heart  for  them. 

He  closes  his  picture  with  a  rollicking  burst  of  humor  which 
contrasts  finely  with  the  grief  of  the  mother  and  her  children. 
One  more  paragraph : 

Then  once  more  I  bowed  my  head.  It  is  no  shame  to  have  wept 
in  Palestine.  I  wept  when  I  saw  Jerusalem,  I  wept  when  I  lay  in 
the  starlight  at  Bethlehem,  I  wept  on  the  blessed  shores  of  Galilee.  My 
hand  was  no  less  firm  on  the  rein,  my  finger  did  not  tremble  on  the 
trigger  of  my  pistol  when  I  rode  with  it  in  my  right  hand  along  the 
shore  of  the  blue  sea  [weeping].  My  eye  was  not  dimmed  by  those 
tears  nor  my  heart  in  aught  weakened.  Let  him  who  would  sneer 
at  my  emotion  close  this  volume  here,  for  he  will  find  little  to  his 
taste  in  my  journeyings  through  Holy  Land. 

He  never  bored  but  he  struck  water. 

I  am  aware  that  this  is  a  pretty  voluminous  notice  of  Mr. 
Grimes's  book.  However,  it  is  proper  and  legitimate  to  speak 

1  "A  koorbash  is  Arabic  for  cowhide,  the  cow  being  a  rhinoceros. 
It  is  the  most  cruel  whip  known  to  fame.  Heavy  as  lead  and  flexible 
as  India-rubber,  usually  about  forty  inches  long  and  tapering  gradually 
from  an  inch  in  diameter  to  a  point,  it  administers  a  blow  which 
leaves  its  mark  for  time." — Scow  Life  in  Egypt,  by  the  same  author. 


382  MARK  TWAIN 

of  it,  for  Nomadic  Life  in  Palestine  is  a  representative  book— 
the  representative  of  a  class  of  Palestine  books — and  a  crit 
icism  upon  it  will  serve  for  a  criticism  upon  them  all.  And 
since  I  am  treating  it  in  the  comprehensive  capacity  of  a  rep 
resentative  book,  I  have  taken  the  liberty  of  giving  to  both 
book  and  author  fictitious  names.  Perhaps  it  is  in  better  taste, 
anyhow,  to  do  this 


CHAPTER  LI 

NAZARETH  is  wonderfully  interesting  because  the  town 
has  an  air  about  it  of  being  precisely  as  Jesus  left  it, 
and  one  finds  himself  saying,  all  the  time,  'The  boy 
Jesus  has  stood  in  this  doorway —  has  played  in  that  street — 
has  touched  these  stones  with  his  hands — has  rambled  over 
these  chalky  hills."  Whoever  shall  write  the  Boyhood  of 
Jesus  ingeniously,  will  make  a  book  which  will  possess  a  vivid 
interest  for  young  and  old  alike.  I  judge  so  from  the  greater 
interest  found  in  Nazareth  than  any  of  our  speculations  upon 
Capernaum  and  the  Sea  of  Galilee  gave  rise  to.  It  was  not 
possible,  standing  by  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  to  frame  more  than 
a  vague,  far-away  idea  of  the  majestic  Personage  who  walked 
upon  the  crested  waves  as  if  they  had  been  solid  earth,  and  who 
touched  the  dead  and  they  rose  up  and  spoke.  I  read  among 
my  notes,  now,  with  a  new  interest,  some  sentences  from  an  edi 
tion  of  .1621  of  the  Apocryphal  New  Testament.  [Extract.] 

Christ,  kissed  by  a  bride  made  dumb  by  sorcerers,  cures  her.  A 
leprous  girl  cured  by  the  water  in  which  the  infant  Christ  was  washed, 
and  becomes  the  servant  of  Joseph  and  Mary.  The  leprous  son  of  a 
Prince  cured  in  like  manner. 

A  young  man  who  had  been  bewitched  and  turned  into  a  mule, 
miraculously  cured  by  the  infant  Saviour  being  put  on  his  back,  and 
is  married  to  the  girl  who  had  been  cured  of  leprosy.  Whereupon  the 
bystanders  praise  God. 

Chapter  16.  Christ  miraculously  widens  or  contracts  gates,  milk 
pails,  sieves,  or  boxes  not  properly  made  by  Joseph,  he  not  being 
skilful  at  his  carpenter's  trade.  The  King  of  Jerusalem  gives  Joseph 
an  order  for  a  throne.  Joseph  works  on  it  for  two  years  and  makes  it 
two  spans  too  short.  The  King  being  angry  with  him,  Jesus  comforts 
him — commands  him  to  pull  one  side  of  the  throne  while  he  pulls  the 
other,  and  brings  it  to  its  proper  dimensions. 

Chapter  19.  Jesus,  charged  with  throwing  a  boy  from  the  roof 
of  a  house,  miraculously  causes  the  dead  boy  to  speak  and  acquit  him ; 
fetches  water  for  his  mother,  breaks  the  pitcher  and  miraculously 
gathers  the  water  in  his  mantle  and  brings  it  home. 

Sent  to  a  schoolmaster,  refuses  to  tell  his  letters,  and  the  schoolmaster 
going  to  whip  him,  his  hand  withers. 

383 


384  MARK  TWAIN 

Further  on  in  this  quaint  volume  of  rejected  gospels  is  an 
epistle  of  St.  Clement  to  the  Corinthians,  which  was  used  in 
the  churches  and  considered  genuine  fourteen  or  fifteen  hun 
dred  years  ago.  In  it  this  account  of  the  fabled  phoenix  occurs : 

1.  Let  us  consider  that  wonderful  type  of   the  resurrection,  which 
is  seen  in  the  Eastern  countries,  that  is  to  say,  in  Arabia. 

2.  There    is    a    certain    bird    called   a    phoenix.      Of    this    there    Js 
never  but  one  at  a  time,  and  that  lives  five  hundred  years.     And  when 
the  time  of  its  dissolution  draws  near,  that  it  must  die,  it  makes  itself 
a  nest  of  frankincense,  and  myrrh,  and  other  spices,  into  which,  when 
its  time  is  fulfilled,  it  enters  and  dies. 

3.  But    its    flesh,    putrefying,   breeds   a   certain   worm,    which    being 
nourished  by  the  juice  of  the  dead  bird,  brings  forth  feathers;  and  when 
it  is  grown  to  a  perfect  state,  it  takes  up  the  nest  in  which  the  bores 
of   its  parent   lie,   and  carries   it   from  Arabia   into   Egypt,   to   a   city 
called  Heliopolis : 

4.  And   flying  in  open  day  in  the  sight  of  all  men,   lays  it  upon 
the  altar  of  the  sun,  and  so  returns  from  whence  it  came. 

5.  The  priests   then   search   into  the  records  of   the  time,  and  find 
that  it  returned  precisely  at  the  end  of  five  hundred  years. 

Business  is  business,  and  there  is  nothing  like  punctuality, 
especially  in  a  phoenix. 

The  few  chapters  relating  to  the  infancy  of  the  Saviour 
contain  many  things  which  seem  frivolous  and  not  worth  pre 
serving.  A  large  part  of  the  remaining  portions  of  the  book 
read  like  good  Scripture,  however.  There  is  one  verse  that 
ought  not  to  have  been  rejected,  because  it  so  evidently  pro 
phetically  refers  to  the  general  run  of  Congresses  of  the 
United  States: 

199.  They  carry  themselves  high,  and  as  prudent  men;  and  though 
they  are  fools,  yet  would  seem  to  be  teachers. 

I  have  set  these  extracts  down,  as  I  found  them.  Every 
where,  among  the  cathedrals  of  France  and  Italy,  one  finds 
traditions  of  personages  that  do  not  figure  in  the  Bible,  and 
of  miracles  that  are  not  mentioned  in  its  pages.  But  they  are 
all  in  this  Apocryphal  New  Testament,  and  though  they  have 
been  ruled  out  of  our  modern  Bible,  it  is  claimed  that  they  were 
accepted  gospel  twelve  or  fifteen  centuries  ago,  and  ranked 
as  high  in  credit  as  any.  One  needs  to  read  this  book  before  he 
visits  those  venerable  cathedrals,  with  their  treasures  of  ta 
booed  and  forgotten  tradition. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  385 

They  imposed  another  pirate  upon  us  at  Nazareth — another 
invincible  Arab  guard.  We  took  our  last  look  at  the  city, 
clinging  like  a  whitewashed  wasp's  nest  to  the  hillside,  and  at 
eight  o'clock  in  the  morning,  departed.  We  dismounted  and 
drove  the  horses  down  a  bridle-path  which  I  think  was  fully 
as  crooked  as  a  corkscrew;  which  I  know  to  be  as  steep  as 
the  downward  sweep  of  a  rainbow,  and  which  I  believe  to  be 
the  worst  piece  of  road  in  the  geography,  except  one  in  the 
Sandwich  Islands,  which  I  remember  painfully,  and  possibly 
one  or  two  mountain-trails  in  the  Sierra  Nevadas.  Often,  in 
this  narrow  path,  the  horse  had  to  poise  himself  nicely  on  a 
rude  stone  step  and  then  drop  his  fore-feet  over  the  edge  and 
down  something  more  than  half  his  own  height.  This  brought 
his  nose  near  the  ground,  while  his  tail  pointed  up  toward  the 
sky  somewhere,  and  gave  him  the  appearance  of  preparing  to 
stand  on  his  head.  A  horse  cannot  look  dignified  in  this  posi 
tion.  We  accomplished  the  long  descent  at  last,  and  trotted 
across  the  great  Plain  of  Esdraelon. 

Some  of  us  will  be  shot  before  we  finish  this  pilgrimage. 
The  pilgrims  read  Nomadic  Life  and  keep  themselves  in  a  con 
stant  state  of  Quixotic  heroism.  They  have  their  hands  on 
their  pistols  all  the  time,  and  every  now  and  then,  when  you 
least  expect  it,  they  snatch  them  out  and  take  aim  at  Bedouins 
who  are  not  visible,  and  draw  their  knives  and  make  savage 
passes  at  other  Bedouins  who  do  not  exist.  I  am  in  deadly 
peril  always,  for  these  spasms  are  sudden  and  irregular,  and, 
of  course,  I  cannot  tell  when  to  be  getting  out  of  the  way.  If 
I  am  accidentally  murdered,  some  time,  during  one  of  these 
romantic  frenzies  of  the  pilgrims,  Mr.  Grimes  must  be  rigidly 
held  to  answer  as  an  accessory  before  the  fact.  If  the  pilgrims 
would  take  deliberate  aim  and  shoot  at  a  man,  it  would  be  all 
right  and  proper — because  that  man  would  not  be  in  any 
danger ;  but  these  random  assaults  are  what  I  object  to.  I  do 
not  wish  to  see  any  more  places  like  Esdraelon,  where  the 
ground  is  level  and  people  can  gallop.  It  puts  melodramatic 
nonsense  into  the  pilgrims'  heads.  All  at  once,  when  one  is 
jogging  along  stupidly  in  the  sun,  and  thinking  about  some 
thing  ever  so  far  away,  here  they  come,  at  a  stormy  gallop, 
spurring  and  whooping  at  those  ridgy  old  sorebacked  plugs 
till  their  heels  fly  higher  than  their  heads,  and,  as  they  whiz 
by,  out  comes  a  little  potato-gun  of  a  revolver,  there  is  a  star 
tling  little  pop,  and  a  small  pellet  goes  singing  through  the  air. 
Now  that  I  have  begun  this  pilgrimage,  I  intend  to  go  through 


386  MARK  TWAIN 

with  it,  though,  sooth  to  say,  nothing  but  the  most  desperate 
valor  has  kept  me  to  my  purpose  up  to  the  present  time.  I  do 
not  mind  Bedouins,— I  am  not  afraid  of  them;  because  neither 
Bedouins  nor  ordinary  Arabs  have  shown  any  disposition  to 
harm  us,  but  I  do  feel  afraid  of  my  comrades. 

Arriving  at  the  furthest  verge  of  the  Plain,  we  rode  a  little 
way  up  a  hill  and  found  ourselves  at  Endor,  famous  for  its 
witch.  Her  descendants  are  there  yet.  They  were  the  wildest 
horde  of  half-naked  savages  we  have  found  thus  far.  They 
swarmed  out  of  mud  bee-hives;  out  of  hovels  of  ^the  dry-goods- 
box  pattern;  out  of  gaping  caves  under  shelving  rocks;  our 
of  crevices  in  the  earth.  In  five  minutes  the  dead  solitude  and 
silence  of  the  place  were  no  more,  and  a  begging,  screeching, 
shouting  mob  were  struggling  about  the  horses'  feet  and  block 
ing  the  way.  "Bucksheesh !  bucksheesh!  bucksheesh!  howajji, 
bucksheesh !"  It  was  Magdala  over  again,  only  here  the  glare 
from  the  infidel  eyes  was  fierce  and  full  of  hate.  The  popu 
lation  numbers  two  hundred  and  fifty,  and  more  than  half  the 
citizens  live  in  caves  in  the  rock.  Dirt,  degradation,  and 
savagery  are  Endor's  specialty.  We  say  no  more  about  Mag 
dala  and  Deburieh  now.  Endor  heads  the  list.  It  is  worse 
than  an  Indian  campoodie.  The  hill  is  barren,  rocky,  and  for 
bidding.  No  sprig  of  grass  is  visible,  and  only  one  tree.  This 
is  a  fig  tree,  which  maintains  a  precarious  footing  among  the 
rocks  at  the  mouth  of  the  dismal  cavern  once  occupied  by  the 
veritable  Witch  of  Endor.  In  this  cavern,  tradition  says, 
Saul,  the  King,  sat  at  midnight,  and  stared  and  trembled,  while 
the  earth  shook,  the  thunders  crashed  among  the  hills,  and  out 
of  the  midst  of  fire  and  smoke  the  spirit  of  the  dead  prophet 
rose  up  and  confronted  him.  Saul  had  crept  to  this  place  im 
the  darkness,  while  his  army  slept,  to  learn  what  fate  awaited 
him  in  the  morrow's  battle.  He  went  away  a  sad  man,  to  meet 
disgrace  and  death. 

A  spring  trickles  out  of  the  rock  in  the  gloomy  recesses  of 
the  cavern,  and  we  were  thirsty.  The  citizens  of  Endor  ob 
jected  to  our  going  in  there.  They  do  not  mind  dirt;  they  do 
not  mind  rags;  they  do  not  mind  vermin;  they  do  not  mind 
barbarous  ignorance  and  savagery;  they  do  not  mind  a  rea 
sonable  degree  of  starvation,  but  they  do  like  to  be  pure  and 
holy  before  their  god,  whoever  he  may  be,  and  therefore  they 
shudder  and  grow  almost  pale  at  the  idea  of  Christian  lips 
polluting  a  spring  whose  waters  must  descend  into  their  sanc 
tified  gullets.  We  had  no  wanton  desire  to  wound  even  their 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  387 

feelings  or  trample  upon  their  prejudices,  but  we  were  out  of 
water,  thus  early  in  the  day,  and  were  burning  up  with  thirst. 
It  was  at  this  time  and  under  these  circumstances  that  I  framed 
an  aphorism  which  has  already  become  celebrated.  I  said: 
"Necessity  knows  no  law."  We  went  in  and  drank. 

We  got  away  from  the  noisy  wretches,  finally,  dropping 
them  in  squads  and  couples  as  we  filed  over  the  hills — the  aged 
first,  the  infants  next,  the  young  girls  further  on;  the  strong 
men  ran  beside  us  a  mile,  and  only  left  when  they  had  secured 
the  last  possible  piaster  in  the  way  if  bucksheesh. 

In  an  hour  we  reached  Nain,  where  Christ  raised  the  widow's 
son  to  life.  Nain  is  Magdala  on  a  small  scale.  It  has  no  pop 
ulation  of  any  consequence.  Within  a  hundred  yards  of  it  is 
the  original  graveyard,  for  aught  I  know;  the  tombstones  lie 
flat  on  the  ground,  which  is  Jewish  fashion  in  Syria.  I  believe 
<the  Moslems  do  not  allow  them  to  have  upright  tombstones. 
A  Moslem  grave  is  usually  roughly  plastered  over  and  white 
washed,  and  has  at  one  end  an  upright  projection  which  is 
shaped  into  exceedingly  rude  attempts  at  ornamentation.  In 
the  cities,  there  is  often  no  appearance  of  a  grave  at  all ;  a  tall, 
slender  marble  tombstone,  elaborately  lettered,  gilded  and 
painted,  marks  the  burial-place,  and  this  is  surmounted  by  a 
turban,  so  carved  and  shaped  as  to  signify  the  dead  man's  rank 
in  life. 

They  showed  a  fragment  of  ancient  wall  which  they  said  was 
one  side  of  the  gate  out  of  which  the  widow's  dead  son  was 
being  brought  so  many  centuries  ago  when  Jesus  met  the  pro 
cession  ; 

Now  when  he  came  nigh  to  the  gate  of  the  city,  behold  there  was 
a  dead  man  carried  out,  the  only  son  of  his  mother,  and  she  was  a 
widow;  and  much  people  of  the  city  was  with  her. 

And  when  the  Lord  saw  her,  he  had  compassion  on  her,  and  said, 
Weep  not. 

And  he  came  and  touched  the  bier :  and  they  that  bare  him  stood 
still.  And  he  said,  Young  man,  I  say  unto  thee,  arise. 

And  he  that  was  dead  sat  up,  and  began  to  speak.  And  he  delivered 
him  to  his  mother. 

And  there  came  a  fear  on  all.  And  they  glorified  God,  saying, 
That  a  great  prophet  is  risen  up  among  us ;  and  That  God  hath 
visited  his  people. 

A  little  mosque  stands  upon  the  spot  which  tradition  says 
was  occupied  by  the  widow's  dwelling.  Two  or  three  aged 
Arabs  sat  about  its  door.  We  entered,  and  the  pilgrims  broke 


388  MARK  TWAIN 

specimens  from  the  foundation  walls,  though  they  had  to  touch, 
and  even  step,  upon  the  "praying-carpets"  to  do  it.  It  was 
almost  the  same  as  breaking  pieces  from  the  hearts  of  those  old 
Arabs.  To  step  rudely  upon  the  sacred  praying-mats,  with 
booted  feet — a  thing  not  done  by  any  Arab— was  to  inflict  pain 
upon  men  who  had  not  offended  us  in  any  way.  Suppose  a 
party  of  armed  foreigners  were  to  enter  a  village  church  in 
America  and  break  ornaments  from  the  altar  railings  for  curi 
osities,  and  climb  up  and  walk  upon  the  Bible  and  the  pulpit 
cushions  ?  However,  the  cases  are  different.  One  is  the  prof 
anation  of  a  temple  of  our  faith— the  other  only  the  prof 
anation  of  a  pagan  one. 

We  descended  to  the  Plain  again,  and  halted  a  moment  at  a 
well — of  Abraham's  time,  no  doubt.  It  was  in  a  desert  place. 
It  was  walled  three  feet  above  ground  with  squared  and  heavy 
blocks  of  stone,  after  the  manner  of  Bible  pictures.  Around 
it  some  camels  stood,  and  others  knelt.  There  was  a  group  of 
sober  little  donkeys  with  naked,  dusky  children  clambering 
about  them,  or  sitting  astride  their  rumps,  or  pulling  their 
tails.  Tawney,  black-eyed,  barefooted  maids,  arrayed  in  rags 
and  adorned  with  brazen  armlets  and  pinchbeck  earrings,  were 
poising  water  jars  upon  their  heads,  or  drawing  water  from  the 
well.  A  flock  of  sheep  stood  by,  waiting  for  the  shepherds  to 
fill  the  hollowed  stones  with  water,  so  that  they  might  drink — 
stones  which,  like  those  that  walled  the  well,  were  worn  smooth 
and  deeply  creased  by  the  chafing  chins  of  a  hundred  genera 
tions  of  _  thirsty  animals.  Picturesque  Arabs  sat  upon  the 
ground,  in  groups,  and  solemnly  smoked  their  long-stemmed 
chibouks.  Other  Arabs  were  filling  black  hogskins  with  water 
—skins  which,  well  filled,  and  distended  with  water  till  the, 
short  legs  projected  painfully  out  of  the  proper  line,  looked' 
like  the  corpses  of  hogs  bloated  by  drowning.  Here  was  a 
grand  Oriental  picture  which  I  had  worshiped  a  thousand  times 
in  soft,  rich  steel  engravings!  But  in  the  engraving  there 
was  no  desolation;  no  dirt;  no  rags;  no  fleas;  no  ugly  features; 
no  sore  eyes;  no  feasting  flies;  no  besotted  ignorance  in  the 
countenances;  no  raw  places  on  the  donkeys " backs ;  no  dis 
agreeable  jabbering  in  unknown  tongues;  no  stench  of  camels; 
no  suggestion  that  a  couple  of  tons  of  powder  placed  under 
the  party  and  touched  off  would  heighten  the  effect  and  give  to 
the  scene  a  genuine  interest  and  a  charm  which  it  would  always 
be  pleasant  to  recall,  even  though  a  man  lived  a  thousand 
years. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  389 

Oriental  scenes  look  best  in  steel  engravings.  I  cannot  be 
imposed  upon  any  more  by  that  picture  of  the  Queen  of  Sheba 
visiting  Solomon.  I  shall  say  to  myself,  You  look  fine,  madam, 
but  your  feet  are  not  clean,  and  you  smell  like  a  camel. 

Presently,  a  wild  Arab  in  charge  of  a  camel-train  recognized 
an  old  friend  in  Ferguson,  and  they  ran  and  fell  upon  each 
other's  necks  and  kissed  each  other's  grimy,  bearded  faces 
upon  both  cheeks.  It  explained  instantly  a  something  which 
had  always  seemed  to  me  only  a  far-fetched  Oriental  figure  of 
speech.  I  refer  to  the  circumstance  of  Christ's  rebuking  a 
Pharisee,  or  some  such  character,  and  reminding  him  that  from 
him  he  had  received  no  "kiss  of  welcome."  It  did  not  seem 
reasonable  to  me  that  men  should  kiss  each  other,  but  I  am 
aware,  now,  that  they  did.  There  was  reason  in  it,  too.  The 
custom  was  natural  and  proper;  because  people  must  kiss, 
.and  a  man  would  not  be  likely  to  kiss  one  of  the  women  of  this 
country  of  his  own  free  will  and  accord.  One  must  travel,  to 
learn.  Every  day,  now,  old  Scriptural  phrases  that  never 
possessed  any  significance  for  me  before  take  to  themselves  a 
meaning. 

We  journeyed  around  the  base  of  the  mountain — "Little 
Hermon," — past  the  old  Crusaders'  castle  of  El  Fuleh,  and 
arrived  at  Shunem.  This  was  another  Magdala,  to  a  fraction, 
frescoes  and  all.  Here,  tradition,  says,  the  prophet  Samuel  was 
born,  and  here  the  Shunamite  woman  built  a  little  house  upon 
the  city  wall  for  the  accommodation  of  the  prophet  Elisha. 
Elisha  asked  her  what  she  expected  in  return.  It  was  a  per 
fectly  natural  question,  for  these  people  are  and  were  in  the 
habit  of  proffering  favors  and  services  and  then  expecting  and 
begging  for  pay.  Elisha  knew  them  well.  He  could  not  com 
prehend  that  anybody  should  build  for  him  that  humble  little 
chamber  for  the  mere  sake  of  old  friendship,  and  with  no  selfish 
motive  whatever.  It  used  to  seem  a  very  impolite,  not  to  say 
a  rude  question,  for  Elisha  to  ask  the  woman,  but  it  does  not 
seem  so  to  me  now.  The  woman  said  she  expected  nothing. 
Then,  for  her  goodness  and  her  unselfishness,  he  rejoiced  her 
heart  with  the  news  that  she  should  bear  a  son.  It  was  a  high 
reward — but  she  would  not  have  thanked  him  for  a  daughter — 
daughters  have  always  been  unpopular  here.  The  son  was 
born,  grew,  waxed  strong,  died.  Elisha  restored  him  to  life 
in  Shunem. 

We  found  here  a  grove  of  lemon  trees — cool,  shady,  hung 
with  fruit.  One  is  apt  to  overestimate  beauty  when  it  is  rare, 


390  MARK  TWAIN 

but  to  me  this  grove  seemed  very  beautiful.  It  was  beautiful. 
I  do  not  overestimate  it.  I  must  always  remember  Shunem 
gratefully,  as  a  place  which  gave  to  us  this  leafy  shelter  after 
our  long,  'hot  ride.  We  lunched,  rested,  chatted,  smoked  our 
pipes  an 'hour,  and  then  mounted  and  moved  on. 

As  we  trotted  across  the  Plain  of  Jezreel,  we  met  half  a 
dozen  Digger  Indians  (Bedouins)  with  very  long  spears  in  their 
hands,  cavorting  around  on  old  crow-bait  horses,  and  spearing 
imaginary  enemies;  whooping,  and  fluttering  their  rags  in  the 
wind,  and  carrying  on  in  every  respect  like  a  pack  of  hopeless 
lunatics.  At  last,  here  were  the  "wild,  free  sons  of  the  desert, 
speeding  over  the  plain  like  the  wind,  on  their  beautiful  Arabian 
mares"  we  had  read  so  much  about  and  longed  so  much  to  see ! 
Here  were  the  "picturesque  costumes" !  This  was  the  "gal 
lant  spectacle"!  Tatterdemalion  vagrants — cheap  braggadocio 
— "Arabian  mares"  spined  and  necked  like  the  ichthyosaurus 
in  the  museum,  and  humped  and  cornered  like  a  dromedary! 
To  glance  at  the  genuine  son  of  the  desert  is  to  take  the  ro 
mance  out  of  him  forever — to  behold  his  steed  is  to  long  in 
charity  to  strip  his  harness  off  and  let  him  fall  to  pieces. 

Presently  we  came  to  a  ruinous  old  town  on  a  hill,  the  same 
being  the  ancient  Jezreel. 

Ahab,  King  of  Samaria  (this  was  a  very  vast  kingdom,  for 
those  days,  and  was  very  nearly  half  as  large  as  Rhode  Island) 
dwelt  in  the  city  of  Jezreel,  which  was  his  capital.  Near  him 
lived  a  man  by  the  name  of  Naboth,  who  had  a  vineyard.  The 
King  asked  him  for  it,  and  when  he  would  not  give  it,  offered 
to  buy  it.  But  Naboth  refused  to  sell  it.  In  those  days  it 
was  considered  a  sort  of  crime  to  part  with  one's  inheritance 
at  any  price — and  even  if  a  man  did  part  with  it,  it  reverted 
to  himself  or  his  heirs  again  at  the  next  jubilee  year.  So  this 
spoiled  child  of  a  King  went  and  lay  down  on  the  bed  with  his 
face  to  the  wall,  and  grieved  sorely.  The  Queen,  a  notorious 
character  in  those  days,  and  whose  name  is  a  byword  and  a 
reproach  even  in  these,  came  in  and  asked  him  wherefore  he 
sorrowed,  and  he  told  her.  Jezebel  said  she  could  secure  the 
vineyard;  and  she  went  forth  and  forged  letters  to  the  nobles 
and  wise  men,  in  the  King's  name,  and  ordered  them  to  pro 
claim  a  fast  and  set  Naboth  on  high  before  the  people,  and 
suborn  two  witnesses  to  swear  that  he  had  blasphemed.  They 
did  it,  and  the  people  stoned  the  accused  by  the  city  wall,  and 
he  died.  Then  Jezebel  came  and  told  the  King,  and  said,  Be 
hold,  Naboth  is  no  more — rise  up  and  seize  the  vineyard.  So 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  391 

Ahab  seized  the  vineyard,  and  went  into  it  to  possess  it.  But 
the  Prophet  Elijah  came  to  him  there  and  read  his  fate  to  him, 
and  the  fate  of  Jezebel ;  and  said  that  in  the  place  where  dogs 
licked  the  blood  of  Naboth,  dogs  should  also  lick  his  blood 
— and  he  said,  likewise,  the  dogs  should  eat  Jezebel  by  the 
wall  of  Jezreel.  In  the  course  of  time,  the  King  was  killed  in 
battle,  and  when  his  chariot  wheels  were  washed  in  the  pool 
of  Samaria,  the  dogs  licked  the  blood.  In  after  years,  Jehu, 
who  was  King  of  Israel,  marched  down  against  Jezreel,  by 
order  of  one  of  the  Prophets,  and  administered  one  of  those 
convincing  rebukes  so  common  among  the  people  of  those  days : 
he  killed  many  kings  and  their  subjects,  and  as  he  came  along 
he  saw  Jezebel,  painted  and  finely  dressed,  looking  out  of  a 
window,  and  ordered  that  she  be  thrown  down  to  him.  A 
servant  did  it,  and  Jehu's  horse  trampled  her  underfoot.  Then 
Jehu  went  in  and  sat  down  to  dinner;  and  presently  he  said, 
Go  and  bury  this  cursed  woman,  for  she  is  a  King's  daughter. 
The  spirit  of  charity  came  upon  him  too  late,  however,  for 
the  prophecy  had  already  been  fulfilled — the  dogs  had  eaten 
her,  and  they  "found  no  more  of  her  than  the  skull  and  the 
feet,  and  the  palms  of  her  hands." 

Ahab,  the  late  King,  had  left  a  helpless  family  behind  him, 
and  Jehu  killed  seventy  of  the  orphan  sons.  Then  he  killed 
all  the  relatives,  and  teachers,  and  servants  and  friends  of  the 
family,  and  rested  from  his  labors,  until  he  was  come  near  to 
Samaria,  where  he  met  forty-two  persons  and  asked  them  who 
they  were;  they  said  they  were  brothers  of  the  King  of 
Judah.  He  killed  them.  When  he  got  to  Samaria,  he  said 
he  would  show  his  zeal  for  the  Lord;  so  he  gathered  all  the 
priests  and  people  together  that  worshiped  Baal,  pretending 
that  he  was  going  to  adopt  that  worship  and  offer  up  a  great 
sacrifice;  and  when  they  were  all  shut  up  where  they  could 
not  defend  themselves,  he  caused  every  person  of  them  to  be 
killed.  Then  Jehu,  the  good  missionary,  rested  from  his  labors 
once  more. 

We  went  back  to  the  valley,  and  rode  to  the  Fountain  of 
Ain  Jelud.  They  call  it  the  Fountain  of  Jezreel,  usually.  It 
is  a  pond  about  one  hundred  feet  square  and  four  feet  deep, 
with  a  stream  of  water  trickling  into  it  from  under  an  over 
hanging  ledge  of  rocks.  It  is  in  the  midst  of  a  great  solitude. 
Here  Gideon  pitched  his  camp  in  the  old  times ;  behind  Shunem 
lay  the  "Midianites,  the  Amalekites,  and  the  Children  of  the 
East,"  who  were  "as  grasshoppers  for  multitude;  both  they 


392  MARK  TWAIN 

and  their  camels  were  without  number,  as  the  sand  by  the 
seaside  for  multitude/'  Which  means  that  there  were  one  hun 
dred  and  thirty-five  thousand  men,  and  that  they  had  trans 
portation  service  accordingly. 

Gideon,  with  only  three  hundred  men,  surprised  them  in  the 
night,  and  stood  by  and  looked  on  while  they  butchered  each 
other  until  a  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  lay  dead  on  the 
field. 

We  camped  at  Jenin  before  night,  and  got  up  and  started 
again  at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning.  Somewhere  toward  day 
light  we  passed  the  locality  where  the  best  authenticated  tradi 
tion  locates  the  pit  into  which  Joseph's  brethren  threw  him, 
and  about  noon,  after  passing  over  a  succession  of  mountain- 
tops,  clad  with  groves  of  fig  and  olive  trees,  with  the  Med 
iterranean  in  sight  some  forty  miles  away,  and  going  by  many 
ancient  Bibical  cities  whose  inhabitants  glowered  savagely  upon 
our  Christian  procession,  and  were  seemingly  inclined  to  prac 
tise  on  it  with  stones,  we  came  to  the  singularly  terraced  and 
unlovely  hills  that  betrayed  that  we  were  out  of  Galilee  and 
into  Samaria  at  last. 

We  climbed  a  high  hill  to  visit  the  city  of  Samaria,  where 
the  woman  may  have  hailed  from  who  conversed  with  Christ 
at  Jacob's  Well,  and  from  whence,  no  doubt,  came  also  the 
celebrated  Good  Samaritan.  Herod  the  Great  is  said  to  have 
made  a  magnificent  city  of  this  place,  and  a  great  number  of 
coarse  limestone  columns,  twenty  feet  high  and  two  feet 
through,  that  are  almost  guiltless  of  architectural  grace  of 
shape  and  ornament,  are  pointed  out  by  many  authors  as  ev 
idence  of  the  fact.  They  would  not  have  been  considered  hand 
some  in  ancient  Greece,  however. 

The  inhabitants  of  this  camp  are  particularly  vicious,  and  f 
stoned  two  parties  of  our  pilgrims  a  day  or  two  ago  who 
brought  about  the  difficulty  by  showing  their  revolvers  when 
they  did  not  intend  to  use  them — a  thing  which  is  deemed  bad 
judgment  in  the  Far  West,  and  ought  certainly  to  be  so  con 
sidered  anywhere.  In  the  new  Territories,  when  a  man  puts 
his  hand  on  a  weapon,  he  knows  that  he  must  use  it ;  he  must 
use  it  instantly  or  expect  to  be  shot  down  where  he  stands. 
Those  pilgrims  had  been  reading  Grimes. 

There  was  nothing  for  as  to  do  in  Samaria  but  buy  hand- 
fuls  of  old  Roman  coins  at  a  franc  a  dozen,  and  look  at  a 
dilapidated  church  of  the  Crusaders  and  a  vault  in  it  which 


THE  TOMB  OF  ADAM 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  393 

once  contained  the  body  of  John  the  Baptist.  The  relic  was 
long  ago  carried  away  to  Genoa. 

Samaria  stood  a  disastrous  siege,  once,  in  the  days  of  Elisha, 
at  the  hands  of  the  King  of  Syria.  Provisions  reached  such 
a  figure  that  "an  ass's  head  was  sold  for  eighty  pieces  of  silver 
and  the  fourth  part  of  a  cab  of  dove's  dung  for  five  pieces  of 
silver." 

An  incident  recorded  of  that  heavy  time  will  give  one  a 
very  good  idea  of  the  distress  that  prevailed  within  these 
crumbling  walls.  As  the  King  was  walking  upon  the  battle 
ments  one  day,  "a  woman  cried  out,  saying,  Help,  my  lord, 
O  King!  And  the  King  said,  What  aileth  thee?  and  she  an 
swered,  This  woman  said  unto  me,  Give  thy  son,  that  we  may 
eat  him  to-day,  and  we  will  eat  my  son  to-morrow.  So  we 
boiled  my  son,  and  did  eat  him ;  and  I  said  unto  her  on  the 
•  next  day,  Give  thy  son  that  we  may  eat  him ;  and  she  hath  hid 
her  son." 

The  prophet  Elisha  declared  that  within  four-and-twenty 
hours  the  prices  of  food  should  go  down  to  nothing,  almost, 
and  it  was  so.  The  Syrian  army  broke  camp  and  fled,  for 
some  cause  or  other,  the  famine  was  relieved  from  without, 
and  many  a  shoddy  speculator  in  dove's  dung  and  ass's  meat 
was  ruined. 

We  were  glad  to  leave  this  hot  and  dusty  old  village  and 
hurry  on.  At  two  o'clock  we  stopped  to  lunch  and  rest  at 
ancient  Shechem,  between  the  historic  Mounts  of  Gerizim 
and  Ebal  where  in  the  old  times  the  books  of  the  law,  the 
curses  and  the  blessings,  were  read  from  the  heights  to  the 
Jewish  multitudes  below. 


CHAPTER  LII 

THE  narrow  canon  in  which  Nablous,  or  Shechem,  is  sit 
uated,  is  under  high  cultivation,  and  the  soil  is  exceed 
ingly  black  and  fertile.  It  is  well  watered,  and  its 
affluent  vegetation  gains  effect  by  contrast  with  the  barren  hills 
that  tower  on  either  side.  One  of  these  hills  is  the  ancient 
Mount  of  Blessings  and  the  other  the  Mount  of  Curses;  and 
wise  men  who  seek  for  fulfilment  of  prophecy  think  they  find 
here  a  wonder  of  this  kind — to  wit,  that  the  Mount  of  Bless 
ings  is  strangely  fertile  and  its  mate  as  strangely  unproductive. 
We  could  not  see  that  there  was  really  much  difference  be 
tween  them  in  this  respect,  however. 

Shechem  is  distinguished  as  one  of  the  residences  of  the 
patriarch  Jacob,  and  as  the  seat  of  those  tribes  that  cut  them 
selves  loose  from  their  brethren  of  Israel  and  propagated 
doctrines  not  in  conformity  with  those  of  the  original  Jewish 
creed.  For  thousands  of  years  this  clan  have  dwelt  in  She 
chem  under  strict  tabu,  and  having  little  commerce  or  fellow 
ship  with  their  fellow-men  of  any  religion  or  nationality.  For 
generations  they  have  not  numbered  more  than  one  or  two 
hundred,  but  they  still  adhere  to  their  ancient  faith  and  main 
tain  their  ancient  rites  and  ceremonies.  Talk  of  family  and 
old  descent !  Princes  and  nobles  pride  themselves  upon  lin 
eages  they  can  trace  back  some  hundreds  of  years.  What  is  this 
trifle  to  this  handful  of  old  first  families  of  Shechem,  who 
can  name  their  fathers  straight  back  without  a  flaw  for  thou 
sands — straight  back  to  a  period  so  remote  that  men  reared  in 
a  country  where  the  days  of  two  hundred  years  ago  are  called 
"ancient"  times  grow  dazed  and  bewildered  when  they  try  to 
comprehend  it!  Here  is  respectability  for  you— -here  is 
"family" — here  is  high  descent  worth  talking  about.  This  sad, 
proud  remnant  of  a  once  mighty  community  still  hold  them 
selves  aloof  from  all  the  world ;  they  still  live  as  their  fathers 
lived,  labor  as  their  fathers  labored,  think  as  they  did,  feel  as 
they  did,  worship  in  the  same  place,  in  sight  of  the  same  land 
marks,  and  in  the  same  quaint,  patriarchal  way  their  ancestors 
did  more  than  thirty  centuries  ago.  I  found  myself  gazing 

394 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  395 

at  any  straggling  scion  of  this  strange  race  with  a  riveted  fas 
cination,  just  as  one  would  stare  at  a  living  mastodon,  or  a 
megatherium  that  had  moved  in  the  gray  dawn  of  creation  and 
seen  the  wonders  of  that  mysterious  world  that  was  before  the 
flood. 

Carefully  preserved  among  the  sacred  archives  of  this  cu 
rious  community  is  a  MS.  copy  of  the  ancient  Jewish  law,  which 
is  said  to  be  the  oldest  document  on  earth.  It  is  written  on 
vellum,  and  is  some  four  or  five  thousand  years  old.  Nothing 
but  bucksheesh  can  purchase  a  sight.  Its  fame  is  somewhat 
dimmed  in  these  latter  days,  because  of  the  doubts  so  many 
authors  of  Palestine  travels  have  felt  themselves  privileged 
to  cast  upon  it.  Speaking  of  this  MS.  reminds  me  that  I  pro 
cured  from  the  high  priest  of  this  ancient  Samaritan  com 
munity,  at  great  expense,  a  secret  document  of  still  higher 
.antiquity  and  far  more  extraordinary  interest,  which  I  pro 
pose  to  publish  as  soon  as  I  have  finished  translating  it. 

Joshua  gave  his  dying  injunction  to  the  children  of  Israel 
at  Shechem,  and  buried  a  valuable  treasure  secretly  under  an 
oak  tree  there  about  the  same  time.  The  superstitious  Samar 
itans  have  always  been  afraid  to  hunt  for  it.  They  believe  it 
is  guarded  by  fierce  spirits  invisible  to  men. 

About  a  mile  and  a  half  from  Shechem  we  halted  at  the  base 
of  Mount  Ebal,  before  a  little  square  area,  inclosed  by  a  high 
stone  wall,  neatly  whitewashed.  Across  one  end  of  this  in- 
closure  is  a  tomb  built  after  the  manner  of  the  Moslems.  It 
is  the  tomb  of  Joseph.  No  truth  is  better  authenticated  than 
this. 

When  Joseph  was  dying  he  prophesied  that  exodus  of  the 
Israelites  from  Egypt  which  occurred  four  hundred  years 
afterward.  At  the  same  time  he  exacted  of  his  people  an  oath 
that  when  they  journeyed  to  the  land  of  Canaan,  they  would 
bear  his  bones  with  them  and  bury  them  in  the  ancient  in 
heritance  of  his  fathers.  The  oath  was  kept. 

And  the  bones  of  Joseph,  which  the  children  of  Israel  brought  up  out 
of  Egypt,  buried  they  in  Shechem,  in  a  parcel  of  ground  which  Jacob 
bought  of  the  sons  of  Hamor  the  father  of  Shechem,  for  a  hundred 
pieces  of  silver. 

Few  tombs  on  earth  command  the  veneration  of  so  many 
races  and  men  of  divers  creeds  as  this  of  Joseph.  "Samaritan 
and  Jew,  Moslem  and  Christian  alike,  revere  it,  and  honor  it 


396  MARK  TWAIN 

with  their  visits.  The  tomb  of  Joseph,  the  dutiful  son,  the 
affectionate,  forgiving  brother,  the  virtuous  man,  the  wise 
Prince  and  ruler.  Egypt  felt  his  influence — the  world  knows 
his  history." 

In  this  same  "parcel  of  ground"  which  Jacob  bought  of  the 
sons  of  Hamor  for  a  hundred  pieces  of  silver,  is  Jacob's  cel 
ebrated  well.  It  is  cut  in  the  solid  rock,  and  is  nine  feet  square 
and  ninety  feet  deep.  The  name  of  this  unpretending  hole  in 
the  ground,  which  one  might  pass  by  and  take  no  notice  of, 
is  as  familiar  as  household  words  to  even  the  children  and  the 
peasants  of  many  a  far-off  country. 

It  is  more  famous  than  the  Parthenon;  it  is  older  than  the 
Pyramids. 

It  was  by  this  well  that  Jesus  sat  and  talked  with  a  woman 
of  that  strange,  antiquated  Samaritan  community  I  have  been 
speaking  of,  and  told  her  of  the  mysterious  water  of  life.  As 
descendants  of  old  English  nobles  still  cherish  in  the  traditions 
of  their  houses  how  that  this  king  or  that  king  tarried  a  day 
with  some  favored  ancestor  three  hundred  years  ago,  no  doubt 
the  descendants  of  the  woman  of  Samaria,  living  there  in 
Shechem,  still  refer  with  pardonable  vanity  to  this  conversation 
of  their  ancestor,  held  some  little  time  gone  by,  with  the 
Messiah  of  the  Christians.  It  is  not  likely  that  they  under 
value  a  distinction  such  as  this.  Samaritan  nature  is  human, 
nature,  and  human  nature  remembers  contact  with  the  illus 
trious,  always. 

For  an  offense  done  to  the  family  honor,  the  sons  of  Jacob 
exterminated  all  Shechem  once. 

We  left  Jacob's  Well  and  traveled  till  eight  in  the  evening, 
but  rather  slowly,  for  we  had  been  in  the  saddle  nineteen  hours, 
and  the  horses  were  cruelly  tired.  We  got  so  far  ahead  of  the 
tents  that  we  had  to  camp  in  an  Arab  village,  and  sleep  on  the 
ground.  We  could  have  slept  in  the  largest  of  the  houses; 
but  there  were  some  little  drawbacks;  it  was  populous  with 
vermin,  it  had  a  dirt  floor,  it  was  in  no  respect  cleanly,  and 
there  was  a  family  of  goats  in  the  only  bedroom,  and  two 
donkeys  in  the  parlor.  Outside  there  were  no  inconveniences, 
except  that  the  dusky,  ragged,  earnest-eyed  villagers  of  both 
sexes  and  all  ages  grouped  themselves  on  their  haunches  all 
around  us,  and  discussed  us  and  criticized  us  with  noisy  tongues 
midnight.  We  did  riot  mind  the  noise,  being  tired, 
but,  doubtless,  the  reader  is  aware  that  it  is  almost  an  im 
possible  thing  to  go  to  sleep  when  you  know  that  people  are 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  397 

looking  at  you.  We  went  to  bed  at  ten,  and  got  up  again  at 
two  and  started  once  more.  Thus  are  people  persecuted  by 
dragomans,  whose  sole  ambition  in  life  is  to  get  ahead  of  each 
other. 

About  daylight  we  passed  Shiloh,  where  the  Ark  of  the 
Covenant  rested  three  hundred  years,  and  at  whose  gates  good 
old  Eli  fell  down  and  "brake  his  neck"  when  the  messenger, 
riding  hard  from  the  battle,  told  him  of  the  defeat  of  his 
people,  the  death  of  his  sons,  and,  more  than  all,  the  capture 
of  Israel's  pride,  her  hope,  her  refuge,  the  ancient  Ark  her 
forefathers  brought  with  them  out  of  Egypt.  It  is  little  wonder 
that  under  circumstances  like  these  he  fell  down  and  brake  his 
neck.  But  Shiloh  had  no  charms  for  us.  We  were  so  cold 
that  there  was  no  comfort  but  in  motion,  and  so  drowsy  we 
could  hardly  sit  upon  the  horses. 

.  After  a  while  we  came  to  a  shapeless  mass  of  ruins,  which 
still  bears  the  name  of  Beth-el.  It  was  here  that  Jacob  lay 
down  and  had  that  superb  vision  of  angels  flitting  up  and  down 
a  ladder  that  reached  from  the  clouds  to  earth,  and  caught 
glimpses  of  their  blessed  home  through  the  open  gates  of 
Heaven. 

The  pilgrims  took  what  was  left  of  the  hallowed  ruin,  and 
we  pressed  on  toward  the  goal  of  our  crusade,  renowned 
Jerusalem. 

The  further  we  went  the  hotter  the  sun  got  and  the  more 
rocky  and  bare,  repulsive  and  dreary  the  landscape  became. 
There  could  not  have  been  more  fragments  of  stone  strewn 
broadcast  over  this  part  of  the  world,  if  every  ten  square  feet 
of  the  land  had  been  occupied  by  a  separate  and  distinct  stone 
cutter's  establishment  for  an  age.  There  was  hardly  a  tree 
or  a  shrub  anywhere.  Even  the  olive  and  the  cactus,  those 
fast  friends  of  a  worthless  soil,  had  almost  deserted  the  coun 
try.  No  landscape  exists  that  is  more  tiresome  to  the  eye 
than  that  which  bounds  the  approaches  to  Jerusalem.  The  only 
difference  between  the  roads  and  the  surrounding  country,  per 
haps,  is  that  there  are  rather  more  rocks  in  the  road  than  in 
the  surrounding  country. 

We  passed  Ramah  and  Beroth,  and  on  the  right  saw  the 
tomb  of  the  prophet  Samuel,  perched  high  upon  a  command 
ing  eminence.  Still  no  Jerusalem  came  in  sight.  We  hurried 
on  impatiently.  We  halted  a  moment  at  the  ancient  Fountain 
of  Beira,  but  its  stones,  worn  deeply  by  the  chins  of  thirsty 
animals  that  are  dead  and  gone  centuries  ago,  had  no  interest 


398  MARK  TWAIN 

for  us— we  longed  to  see  Jerusalem.  We  spurred  up  hill  after 
hill,  and  usually  began  to  stretch  our  necks  minutes  before 
we  got  to  the  top — but  disappointed  always  followed — more 
stupid  hills  beyond— more  unsightly  landscape— no  Holy  City. 

At  last,  awa'y  in  the  middle  of  the  day,  ancient  bits  of  wall 
and  crumbling  arches  began  to  line  the  way— we  toiled  up 
one  more  hill,  and  every  pilgrim  and  every  sinner  swung  his 
ha£  on  high !  Jerusalem ! 

Perched  on  'its  eternal  hills,  white  and  domed  and  solid, 
I  massed  together  and  hooped  with  high  gray  walls,  the  ven- 
\  }  erable  city  gleamed  in  the  sun.  So  small !  WThy,^  it  was  no 
U  larger  than  an  American  village  of  four  thousand  inhabitants, 
/(  and  no  larger  than  an  ordinary  Syrian  city  of  thirty  thousand, 
/I  Jerusalem  numbers  only  fourteen  thousand  people.^ 

We  dismounted  and  looked,  without  speaking  a  dozen  sen 
tences,  across  the  wide  intervening  valley  for  an  hour  or  more ; 
and  noted  those  prominent  features  of  the  city  that  pictures 
make  familiar  to  all  men  from  their  school-days  till  their  death. 
We  could  recognize  the  Tower  of  Hippicus,  the  Mosque  of 
Omar,  the  Damascus  Gate,  the  Mount  of  Olives,  the  Valley 
of  Jehoshaphat,  the  Tower  of  David,  and  the  Garden  of  Geth- 
semane — and  dating  from  these  landmarks  could  tell  very 
nearly  the  localities  of  many  others  we  were  not  able  to  dis 
tinguish. 

I  record  it  here  as  a  notable  but  not  discreditable  fact  that 
not  even  our  pilgrims  wept.  I  think  there  was  no  individual 
in  the  party  whose  brain  was  not  teeming  with  thoughts  and 
images  and  memories  invoked  by  the  grand  history  of  the 
venerable  city  that  lay  before  us,  but  still  among  them  all  was 
no  "voice  of  them  that  wept." 

There  was  no  call  for  tears.  Tears  would  have  been  out  of 
place.  The  thoughts  Jerusalem  suggests  are  full  of  poetry, 
sublimity,  and  more  than  all,  dignity.  Such  thoughts  do  not 
find  their  appropriate  expression  in  the  emotions  of  the  nursery. 

Just  after  noon  we  entered  these  narrow,  crooked  streets, 
by  the  ancient  and  the  famed  Damascus  Gate,  and  now  for 
several  hours  I  have  been  trying  to  comprehend  that  I  am 
actually  in  the  illustrious  old  city  where  Solomon  dwelt,  where 
Abraham  held  converse  with  the  Deity,  and  where  walls  still 
stand  that  witnessed  the  spectacle  of  the  Crucifixion. 


CHAPTER  LIII 

A  FAST  walker  could  go  outside  the  walls  of  Jerusalem 
and  walk  entirely  around  the  city  in  an  hour.  I  do 
not  know  how  else  to  make  one  understand  how  small 
it  is.  The  appearance  of  the  city  is  peculiar.  It  is  as  knobby 
with  countless  little  domes  as  a  prison  door  is  with  bolt-heads. 
Every  house  has  from  one  to  half  a  dozen  of  these  white  plas 
tered  domes  of  stone,  broad  and  low,  sitting  in  the  center 
of,  or  in  a  cluster  upon,  the  flat  roof.  Wherefore,  when  one 
looks  down  from  an  eminence,  upon  the  compact  mass  of 
houses  (so  closely  crowded  together,  in  fact,  that  there  is  no 
appearance  of  streets  at  all,  and  so  the  city  looks  solid)  he 
sees  the  knobbiest  town  in  the  world,  except  Constantinople. 
It  looks  as  if  it  might  be  roofed,  from  center  to  circumference, 
with  inverted  saucers.  The  monotony  of  the  view  is  in 
terrupted  only  by  the  great  Mosque  of  Omar,  the  Tower  of 
Hippicus,  and  one  or  two  other  buildings  that  rise  into  com 
manding  prominence. 

The  houses  are  generally  two  stories  high,  built  strongly 
of  masonry,  whitewashed  or  plastered  outside,  and  have  a  cage 
of  wooden  latticework  projecting  in  front  of  every  window. 
To  reproduce  a  Jerusalem  street,  it  would  only  be  necessary 
to  up-end  a  chicken-coop  and  hang  it  before  each  window  in  an 
alley  of  American  houses. 

The  streets  are  roughly  and  badly  paved  with  stone,  and 
are  tolerably  crooked — enough  so  to  make  each  street  appear 
to  close  together  constantly  and  come  to  an  end  about  a  hun 
dred  yards  ahead  of  a  pilgrim  as  long  as  he  chooses  to 
walk  in  it.  Projecting  from  the  top  of  the  lower  story  of 
many  of  the  houses  is  a  very  narrow  porch-roof  or  shed,  with 
out  supports  from  below;  and  I  have  several  times  seen  cats 
jump  across  the  street  from  one  shed  to  the  other  when  they 
were  out  calling.  The  cats  could  have  jumped  double  the 
distance  without  extraordinary  exertion.  I  mention  these 
things  to  give  an  idea  of  how  narrow  the  streets  are.  Since 

399 


400  MARK  TWAIN 

a  cat  can  jump  across  them  without  the  least  inconvenience, 
it  is  hardly  necessary  to  state  that  such  streets  are  too  narrow 
for  carriages.  These  vehicles  cannot  navigate  the  Holy  City. 

The  population  of  Jerusalem  is  composed  of  Moslems,  Jews, 
Greeks,  Latins,  Armenians,  Syrians,  Copts,  Abyssinians,  Greek- 
Catholics,  and  a  handful  of  Protestants.  One  hundred  of  the 
latter  sect  are  all  that  dwell  now  in  this  birthplace  of  Chris 
tianity.  The  nice  shades  of  nationality  comprised  in  the  above 
list,  and  the  languages  spoken  by  them,  are  altogether  too 
numerous  to  mention.  It  seems  to  me  that  ail  the  races  and 
colors  and  tongues  of  the  earth  must  be  represented  among 
the  fourteen  thousand  souls  that  dwell  in  Jerusalem.  .Rags, 
wretchedness,  poverty,  and  dirt,  those  signs  and  symbols  that 
indicate  the  presence  of  Moslem  rule  more  surely  than  the 
crescent  flag  itself,  abound.  Lepers,  cripples,  the  blind,  and 
the  idiotic,  assail  you  on  every  hand,  and  they  knp_w  but  one 
language  apparently — the  eternal  "bucksheesh/'  £lo  see  the 
numbers  of  maimed,  malformed,  and  diseased  humanity  that 
throng  the  holy  places  and  obstruct  the  gates,  one  might  sup 
pose  that  the  ancient  days  had  come  again,  and  that  the  angel 
of  the  Lord  was  expected  to  descend  at  any  moment  to  stir 
|  the  waters  of  Bethseda.  Jerusalem  is  mournful,  and  dreary, 
and  lifeless.  I  would  not  desire  to  live  herej> 

One  naturally  goes  first  to  the  Holy  SepuTcher.  It  is  right 
in  the  city,  near  the  western  gate;  "it  and  the  place  of  the 
Crucifixion,  and,  in  fact,  every  other  place  intimately  con 
nected  with  that  tremendous  event,  are  ingeniously  massed 
together  and  covered  by  one  roof — the  dome  of  the  Church  of 
the  Holy  Sepulcher. 

Entering  the  building,  through  the  midst  of  the  usual  assem 
blage  of  beggars,  one  sees  on  his  left  a  few  Turkish  guards 
— for  Christians  of  different  sects  will  not  only  quarrel,  but 
fight,  also,  in  this  sacred  place,  if  allowed  to  do  it.  Before  you 
is  a  marble  slab,  which  covers  the  Stone  of  Unction,  whereon 
the  Saviour's  body  was  laid  to  prepare  it  for  burial.  It  was 
found  necessary  to  conceal  the  real  stone  in  this  way  in  order 
to  save  it  from  destruction.  Pilgrims  were  too  much  given  to 
chipping  off  pieces  of  it  to  carry  home.  Near  by  is  a  circular 
railing  which  marks  the  spot  where  the  Virgin  stood  when  the 
Lord's  body  was  annointed. 

Entering  the  great  Rotunda,  we  stand  before  the  most 
sacred  locality  in  Christendom— the  grave  of  Jesus.  It  is  in 
the  center  of  the  church,  and  immediately  under  the  great 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  401 

dome.  It  is  inclosed  in  a  sort  of  little  temple  of  yellow  and 
white  stone,  of  fanciful  design.  Within  the  little  temple  is 
a  portion  of  the  very  stone  which  was  rolled  away  from 
the  door  of  the  Sepulcher,  and  on  which  the  angel  was  sitting 
when  Mary  came  thither  "at  early  dawn."  Stooping  low,  we 
enter  the  vault — the  Sepulcher  itself.  It  is  only  about  six 
feet  by  seven,  and  the  stone  couch  on  which  the  dead  Saviour 
lay  extends  from  end  to  end  of  the  apartment  and  occupies 
half  its  width.  It  is  covered  with  a  marble  slab  which  had 
been  much  worn  by  the  lips  of  pilgrims.  This  slab  serves  as 
an  altar  now.  Over  it  hang  some  fifty  gold  and  silver  lamps, 
which  are  kept  always  burning,  and  the  place  is  otherwise 
scandalized  by  trumpery  gewgaws  and  tawdry  ornamentation. 

All  sects  of  Christians  (except  Protestants)  have  chapels 
under  the  roof  of  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher,  and  each 
.must  keep  to  itself  and  not  venture  upon  another's  ground. 
It  has  been  proAren  conclusively  that  they  cannot  worship  to 
gether  around  the  grave  of  the  Saviour  of  the  World  in  peace. 
The  chapel  of  the  Syrians  is  not  handsome;  that  of  the  Copts 
is  the  humblest  of  them  all.  It  is  nothing  but  a  dismal  cavern, 
roughly  hewn  in  the  living  rock  of  the  Hill  of  Calvary.  In  one 
side  of  it  two  ancient  tombs  are  hewn,  which  are  claimed  to 
be  those  in  which  Nicodemus  and  Joseph  of  Arimathea  were 
buried. 

As  we  moved  among  the  great  piers  and  pillars  of  another 
part  of  the  church,  we  came  upon  a  party  of  black-robed,  an 
imal-looking  Italian  monks,  with  candles  in  their  hands,  who 
were  chanting  something  in  Latin,  and  going  through  some 
kind  of  religious  performance  around  a  disk  of  white  marble 
let  into  the  floor.  It  was  there  that  the  risen  Saviour  ap 
peared  to  Mary  Magdalen  in  the  likeness  of  a  gardener. 
Near  by  was  a  similar  stone,  shaped  like  a  star — here  the 
Magdalen  herself  stood,  at  the  same  time.  Monks  were  per 
forming  in  this  place,  also.  They  perform  everywhere — all 
over  the  vast  building,  and  at  all  hours.  Their  candles  are 
always  flitting  about  in  the  gloom,  and  making  the  dim  old 
church  more  dismal  than  there  is  any  necessity  that  it  should 
be,  even  though  it  is  a  tomb. 

We  were  shown  the  place  where  our  Lord  appeared  to  His 
mother  after  the  Resurrection.  Here,  also,  a  marble  slab 
marks  the  place  where  St.  Helena,  the  mother  of  the  Emperor 
Constantine,  found  the  crosses  about  three  hundred  years 
after  the  Crucifixion.  According  to  the  legend,  this  great  dis- 


402  MARK  TWAIN 

covery  elicited  extravagant  demonstrations  of  joy.  But  they 
were  of  short  duration.  The  question  intruded  itself :  "Which 
bore  the  blessed  Saviour,  and  which  the  thieves?"  To  be  in 
doubt,  in  so  mighty  a  matter  as  this — to  be  uncertain  which 
one  to  adore — was  a  grievous  misfortune.  It  turned  the  pub 
lic  joy  into  sorrow.  But  when  lived  there  a  holy  priest  who 
could  not  set  so  simple  a  trouble  as  this  at  rest?  One  of  these 
soon  hit  upon  a  plan  that  would  be  a  certain  test.  A  noble  lady 
lay  very  ill  in  Jerusalem.  The  wise  priests  ordered  that  the 
three  crosses  be  taken  to  her  bedside  one  at  a  time.  It  was 
done.  When  her  eyes  fell  upon  the  first  one,  she  uttered  a 
scream  that  was  heard  beyond  the  Damascus  Gate,  and  even 
upon  the  Mount  of  Olives,  it  was  said,  and  then  fell  back  in 
a  deadly  swoon.  They  recovered  her  and  brought  the  second 
cross.  Instantly  she  went  into  fearful  convulsions,  and  it 
was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  six  strong  men  could  hold 
her.  They  were  afraid,  now,  to  bring  in  the  third  cross.  They 
began  to  fear  that  possibly  they  had  fallen  upon  the  wrong 
crosses,  and  that  the  true  cross  was  not  with  this  number  at 
all.  However,  as  the  woman  seemed  likely  to  die  with  the 
convulsions  that  were  tearing  her,  they  concluded  that  the 
third  could  do  no  more  than  put  her  out  of  her  misery  with 
a  happy  despatch.  So  they  brought  it,  and  behold,  a  miracle ! 
The  woman  sprang  from  her  bed,  smiling  and  joyful,  and 
perfectly  restored  to  health.  When  we  listen  to  evidence  like 
this,  we  cannot  but  believe.  We  would  be  ashamed  to  doubt, 
and  properly,  too.  Even  the  very  part  of  Jerusalem  where 
this  all  occurred  is  there  yet.  So  there  is  really  no  room  for 
doubt. 

The  priest  tried  to  show  us,  through  a  small  screen,  a 
fragment  of  the  genuine  Pillar  of  Flagellation,  to  which 
Christ  was  bound  when  they  scourged  him.  But  we  could 
not  see  it,  because  it  was  dark  inside  the  screen.  However,  a 
baton  is  kept  here,  which  the  pilgrim  thrusts  through  a  hole 
in  the  screen,  and  then  he  no  longer  doubts  that  the  true  Pillar 
of  Flagellation  is  in  there.  He  cannot  have  any  excuse  to 
doubt  it,  for  he  can  feel  it  with  the  stick.  He  can  feel  it  as 
distinctly  as  he  could  feel  anything. 

Not  far  from  hear  was  a  niche  where  they  used  to  preserve 
a  piece  of  the  True  Cross,  but  it  is  gone  now.  This  piece 
of  the  cross  was  discovered  in  the  sixteenth  century.  The 
-Latin  priests  say  it  was  stolen  away,  long  ago,  by  priests 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  403 

of  another  sect.  That  seems  like  a  hard  statement  to  make, 
but  we  know  very  well  that  it  was  stolen,  because  we  have 
seen  it  ourselves  in  several  of  the  cathedrals  of  Italy  and 
France. 

But  the  relic  that  touched  us  most  was  the  plain  old  sword 
of  that  stout  Crusader,  Godfrey  of  Bouillon — King  Godfrey 
of  Jerusalem.  No  blade  in  Christendom  wields  such  enchant 
ment  as  this — no  blade  of  all  that  rust  in  the  ancestral  halls 
of  Europe  is  able  to  invoke  such  visions  of  romance  in  the 
brain  of  him  who  looks  upon  it — none  that  can  prate  of  such 
chivalric  deeds  or  tell  such  brave  tales  of  the  warrior  days 
of  old.  It  stirs  within  a  man  every  memory  of  the  Holy 
Wars  that  has  been  sleeping  in  his  brain  for  years,  and 
peoples  his  thoughts  with  mail-clad  images,  with  marching 
armies,  with  battles  and  with  sieges.  It  speaks  to  him  of  Bald 
win,  and  Tancred,  the  princely  Saladin,  and  great  Richard  of 
the  Lion  Heart.  It  was  with  just  such  blades  as  these  that 
these  splendid  heroes  of  romance  used  to  segregate  a  man, 
so  to  speak,  and  leave  the  half  of  him  fall  one  way  and  the 
other  half  the  other.  This  very  sword  has  cloven  hun 
dreds  of  Saracen  Knights  from  crown  to  chin  in  those  old 
times  when  Godfrey  wielded  it.  It  was  enchanted,  then,  by 
a  genius  that  was  under  the  command  of  King  Solomon. 
When  danger  approached  its  master's  tent  it  always  struck 
the  shield  and  clanged  out  a  fierce  alarm  upon  the  startled  ear 
of  night.  In  times  of  doubt,  or  in  fog  or  darkness,  if  it  were 
drawn  from  its  sheath  it  would  point  instantly  toward  the 
foe,  and  thus  reveaal  the  way — and  it  would  also  attempt  to 
start  after  them  of  its  own  accord.  A  Christian  could  not 
be  so  disguised  that  it  would  not  know  him  and  refuse  to 
hurt  him — nor  a  Moslem  so  disguised  that  it  would  not  leap 
from  its  scabbard  and  take  his  life.  These  statements  are  all 
well  authenticated  in  many  legends  that  are  among  the  most 
trustworthy  legends  the  good  old  Catholic  monks  preserve. 
I  can  never  forget  old  Godfrey's  sword  now.  I  tried  it  on 
a  Moslem,  and  clove  him  in  twain  like  a  doughnut.  The 
spirit  of  Grimes  was  upon  me,  and  if  I  had  had  a  graveyard  I 
would  have  destroyed  all  the  infidels  in  Jerusalem.  I  wiped 
the  blood  off  the  old  sword  and  handed  it  back  to  the  priest — 
I  did  not  want  the  fresh  gore  to  obliterate  those  sacred  spots 
that  crimsoned  its  brightness  one  day  six  hundred  years  ago 
and  thus  gave  Godfrey  warning  that  before  the  sun  went  down 
his  journey  of  life  would  end. 


404  MARK  TWAIN 

Still  moving  through  the  gloom  of  the  Church  of  the  Holy 
Sepulcher  we  came  to  a  small  chapel,  hewn  out  of  the  rock — 
a  place  which  has  been  known  as  "The  Prison  of  Our  Lord" 
for  many  centuries.  Tradition  says  that  here  the  Saviour  was 
confined  just  previously  to  the  crucifixion.  Under  an  altar 
by  the  door  was  a  pair  of  stone  stocks  for  human  legs.  These 
things  are  called  the  "Bonds  of  Christ,"  and  the  use  they 
were  once  put  to  has  given  them  the  name  they  now  bear. 

The  Greek  Chapel  is  the  most  roomy,  the  richest  and  the 
showiest  chapel  in  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher.  Its  altar, 
like  that  of  all  the  Greek  churches,  is  a  lofty  screen  that 
extends  clear  across  the  chapel,  and  is  gorgeous  with  gilding 
and  pictures.  The  numerous  lamps  that  hang  before  it  are  of 
gold  and  silver,  and  cost  great  sums. 

But  the  feature  of  the  place  is  a  short  column  that  rises  f rntn 
the  middle  of  the  marble  pavement  of  the  chapel,  and  marks 
the  exact  center  of  the  earth.  The  most  reliable  traditions  tell 
us  that  this  was  known  to  be  the  earth's  center,  ages  ago,  and 
that  when  Christ  was  upon  earth  he  set  all  doubts  upon  the 
subject  at  rest  forever,  by  stating  with  his  own  lips  that  the 
tradition  was  correct.  Remember  He  said  that  that  particular 
column  stood  upon  the  center  of  the  world.  If  the  center  of 
the  world  changes,  the  column  changes  its  position  accordingly. 
This  column  has  moved  three  different  times,  of  its  own 
accord.  This  is  because,  in  great  convulsions  of  nature,  at 
three  different  times,  masses  of  the  earth — whole  ranges  of 
mountains,  probably — have  flown  off  into  space,  thus  lessening 
the  diameter  of  the  earth,  and  changing  the  exact  locality  of 
its  center  by  a  point  or  two.  This  is  a  very  curious  and  in 
teresting  circumstance,  and  is  a  withering  rebuke  to  those 
philosophers  who  would  make  us  believe  that  it  is  not  possible  i 
for  any  portion  of  the  earth  to  fly  off  into  space. 

To  satisfy  himself  that  this  spot  was  really  the  center  of  the 
earth,  a  skeptic  once  paid  well  for  the  privilege  of  ascending 
to  the  dome  of  the  church  to  see  if  the  sun  gave  him  a  shadow 
at  noon.  He  came  down  perfectly  convinced.  The  day  was 
very  cloudy  and  the  sun  threw  no  shadows  at  all ;  but  the  man 
was  satisfied  that  if  the  sun  had  come  out  and  made  shadows 
it  could  not  have  made  any  for  him.  Proofs  like  these  are  not 
to  be  set  aside  by  the  idle  tongues  of  cavilers.  To  such  as  are 
not  bigoted,  and  are  willing  to  be  convinced,  they  carry  a  convic 
tion  that  nothing  can  ever  shake. 

If  even  greater  proofs  than  those  I  have  mentioned  are 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  405 

wanted,  to  satisfy  the  headstrong  and  the  foolish  that  this  is 
the  genuine  center  of  the  earth,  they  are  here.  The  greatest 
of  them  lies  in  the  fact  that  from  under  this  very  column  was 
taken  the  dust  from  which  Adam  was  made.  This  can  surely 
be  regarded  in  the  light  of  a  settler.  It  is  not  likely  that  the 
original  first  man  would  have  been  made  from  an  inferior 
quality  of  earth  when  it  was  entirely  convenient  to  get  first 
quality  from  the  world's  center.  This  will  strike  any  reflect 
ing  mind  forcibly.  That  Adam  was  formed  of  dirt  procured 
in  this  very  spot  is  amply  proven  by  the  fact  that  in  six 
thousand  years  no  man  has  ever  been  able  to  prove  that  the 
dirt  was  not  procured  here  whereof  he  was  made. 

It  is  a  singular  circumstance  that  right  under  the  roof  of 
this  same  great  church,  and  not  far  away  from  that  illustrious 
column,  Adam  himself,  the  father  of  the  human  race,  lies 
buried.  There  is  no  question  that  he  is  actually  buried  in  the 
'grave  which  is  pointed  out  as  his — there  can  be  none — because 
it  has  never  yet  been  proved  that  that  grave  is  not  the  grave 
in  which  he  is  buried. 

(The  tomb  of  Adam!  How  touching  it  was,  here  in  a  land 
of  strangers,  far  away  from  home,  and  friends,  and  all  who 
cared  for  me,  thus  to  discover  the  grave  of  a  blood  relation. 
True,  a  distant  one,  but  still  a  relation.  The  unerring  instinct 
of  nature  thrilled  its  recognition.  The  fountain  of  my  filial 
affection  was  stirred  to  its  profoundest  depths,  and  I  gave  way  j  f 
to  tumultuous  emotion.  I  learned  upon  a  pillar  and  burst  into  J 
tears.  I  deem  it  no  shame  to  have  wept  over  the  grave  of  my 
poor  dead  relative!}  Let  him  who  would  sneer  at  my  emotion 
close  this  volume  Here,  for  he  will  find  little  to  his  taste  in  my 
journeyings  through  Holy  Land.  Noble  old  man — he  did 
not  live  to  see  me — he  did  live  to  see  his  child.  And  I — I — 
alas,  I  did  not  live  to  see  him.  Weighed  down  by  sorrow  and 
disappointment,  he  died  before  I  was  born — six  thousand  brief 
summers  before  I  was  born.  But  let  us  try  to  bear  it  with 
fortitude.  Let  us  trust  that  he  is  better  off  where  he  is.  Let 
us  take  comfort  in  the  thought  that  his  loss  is  our  eternal  gain. 

The  next  place  the  guide  took  us  to  in  the  holy  church  was 
an  altar  dedicated  to  the  Roman  soldier  who  was  of  the 
military  guard  that  attended  at  the  Crucifixion  to  keep  order, 
and  who — when  the  veil  of  the  Temple  was  rent  in  the  awful 
darkness  that  followed;  when  the  rock  of  Golgotha  was  split 
asunder  by  an  earthquake ;  when  the  artillery  of  heaven  thund 
ered,  and  in  the  baleful  glare  of  the  lightnings  the  shrouded 


406  MARK  TWAIN 

dead  flitted  about  the  streets  of  Jerusalem — shook  with  fear 
and  said,  "Surely  this  was  the  Son  of  God !"  Where  this  altar 
stands  now,  that  Roman  soldier  stood  then,  in  full  view  of 
the  crucified  Saviour — in  full  sight  and  hearing  of  all  the 
marvels  that  were  transpiring  far  and  wide  about  the  circum 
ference  of  the  Hill  of  Calvary.  And  in  this  selfsame  spot 
the  priests  of  the  Temple  beheaded  him  for  those  blasphemous 
words  he  had  spoken. 

In  this  altar  they  used  to  keep  one  of  the  most  curious  relics 
that  human  eyes  ever  looked  upon — a  thing  that  had  power 
to  fascinate  the  beholder  in  some  mysterious  way  and  keep 
him  gazing  for  hours  together.  It  was  nothing  less  than  the 
copper  plate  Pilate  put  upon  the  Saviour's  cross,  and  upon 
which  he  wrote,  "THIS  is  THE  KING  OF  THE  JEWS."  I  think 
St.  Helena,  the  mother  of  Constantine,  found  this  wonderful 
memento  when  she  was  here  in  the  'third  century.  She 
traveled  all  over  Palestine,  and  was  always  fortunate.  When 
ever  the  good  old  enthusiast  found  a  thing  mentioned  in  her 
Bible,  Old  or  New,  she  would  go  and  search  for  that  thing, 
and  never  stop  until  she  found  it.  If  it  was  Adam,  she  would 
find  Adam;  if  it  was  the  Ark,  she  would  find  the  Ark;  if  it 
was  Goliah,  or  Joshua,  she  would  find  them.  She  found  the 
inscription  here  that  I  was  speaking  of,  I  think.  She  found 
it  in  this  very  spot,  close  to  where  the  martyred  Roman  soldier 
stood.  That  copper  plate  is  in  one  of  the  churches  in  Rome 
now.  Any  one  can  see  it  there.  The  inscription  is  very 
distinct. 

We  passed  along  a  few  steps  and  saw  the  altar  built  over 
the  very  spot  where  the  good  Catholic  priests  say  the  soldiers 
divided  the  raiment  of  the  Saviour. 

Then  we  went  down  into  a  cavern  which  cavilers  say  was 
once  a  cistern.  It  is  a  chapel  now,  however — the  Chapel  of 
St.^  Helena.  It  is  fifty-one  feet  long  by  forty-three  wide,  In 
it  is  a  marble  chair  which  Helena  used  to  sit  in  while  she 
superintended  her  workmen  when  they  were  digging  and  delv 
ing  for  the  True  Cross.  In  this  place  is  an  altar  dedicated  to 
St.  Dimas,  the  penitent  thief.  A  new  bronze  statue  is  here — a 
statue  of  St.  Helena.  It  reminded  us  of  poor  Maximilian, 
so  lately  shot.  He  presented  it  to  this  chapel  when  he  was 
about  to  leave  for  his  throne  in  Mexico. 

From  the  cistern  we  descended  twelve  steps  into  a  large 
roughly  shaped  grotto,  carved  wholly  out  of  the  living  rock, 
Helena  blasted  it  out  when  she  was  searching  for  the  true  cross. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  407 

She  had  a  laborious  piece  of  work  here,  but  it  was  richly 
rewarded.  Out  of  this  place  she  got  the  crown  of  thorns,  the 
nails  of  the  cross,  the  true  cross  itself,  and  the  cross  of  the 
penitent  thief.  When  she  thought  she  had  found  everything 
and  was  about  to  stop,  she  was  told  in  a  dream  to  continue  a 
day  longer.  It  was  very  fortunate.  She  did  so,  and  found  the 
cross  of  the  other  thief. 

The  walls  and  roof  of  this  grotto  still  weep  bitter  tears  in 
memory  of  the  event  that  transpired  on  Calvary,  and  devout 
pilgrims  groan  and  sob  when  these  sad  tears  fall  upon  them 
from  the  dripping  rock.  The  monks  call  this  apartment  of 
the  "Chapel  of  the  Invention  of  the  Cross" — a  name  which 
is  unfortunate,  because  it  leads  the  ignorant  to  imagine  that 
a  tacit  acknowledgment  is  thus  made  that  the  tradition  that 
Helena  found  the  true  cross  here  is  a  fiction — an  invention. 
It  is  a  happiness  to  know,  however,  that  intelligent  people  do 
'"not  doubt  the  story  in  any  of  its  particulars. 

Priests  of  any  of  the  chapels  and  denominations  in  the 
Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher  can  visit  this  sacred  grotto  to 
weep  and  pray  and  worship  the  gentle  Redeemer.  Two  differ 
ent  congregations  are  not  allowed  to  enter  at  the  same  time, 
however,  because  they  always  fight. 

Still  marching  through  the  venerable  Church  of  the  Holy 
Sepulcher,  among  chanting  priests  in  coarse  long  robes  and 
sandals;  pilgrims  of  all  colors  and  many  nationalities,  in  all 
sorts  of  strange  costumes;  under  dusky  arches  and  by  dingy 
piers  and  columns ;  through  a  somber  cathedral  gloom,  freight 
ed  with  smoke  and  incense,  and  faintly  starred  with  scores  of 
candles  that  appeared  suddenly  and  as  suddenly  disappeared, 
or  drifted  mysteriously  hither  and  thither  about  the  distant 
aisles  like  ghostly  jack-o'-lanterns — we  came  as  last  to  a  small 
chapel  which  is  called  the  "Chapel  of  the  Mocking."  Under 
the  altar  was  a  fragment  of  a  marble  column ;  this  was  the  seat 
Christ  sat  on  when  he  was  reviled,  and  mockingly  made  King, 
crowned  with  a  crown  of  thorns  and  sceptered  with  a  reed.  It 
was  here  that  they  blindfolded  him  and  struck  him,  and  said 
in  derision,  "Prophesy  who  it  is  that  smote  thee."  The  tradi 
tion  that  this  is  the  identical  spot  of  the  mocking  is  a  very 
ancient  one.  The  guide  said  that  Saewulf  was  the  first  to 
mention  it.  I  do  not  know  Saewulf,  but  still,  I  cannot  well 
refuse  to  receive  his  evidence — none  of  us  can. 

They  showed  us  where  the  great  Godfrey  and  his  brother 
Baldwin,  the  first  Christian  Kings  of  Jerusalem,  once  lay 


408  MARK  TWAIN 

buried  by  that  sacred  sepulcher  they  had  fought  so  long  and  so 
valiantly  to  wrest  from  the  hands  of  the  infidel.  But  the  niches 
that  had  contained  the  ashes  of  these  renowned  crusaders  were 
empty.  Even  the  coverings  of  their  tombs  jwere  gone — 
destroyed  by  devout  members  of  the  Greek  church,  because 
Godfrey  and  Baldwin  were  Latin  princes,  and  had  been  reared 
in  a  Christian  faith  whose  creed  differed  in  some  unimportant 
respect  from  theirs. 

We  passed  on,  and  halted  before  the  tomb  of  Melchisedek ! 
You  will  remember  Melchisedek,  no  doubt;  he  was  the  King 
who  came  out  and  levied  a  tribute  on  Abraham  the  time  that 
he  pursued  Lot's  captors  to  Dan,  and  took  all  their  property 
from  them.  That  was  about  four  thousand  years  ago,  and 
Melchisedek  died  shortly  afterward.  However,  his  tomb  is 
in  a  good  state  of  preservation. 

When  one  enters  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher,  the 
Sepulcher  itself  is  the  first  thing  he  desires  to  see,  and  really 
is  almost  the  first  thing  he  does  see.     The  next  thing  he  has 
a  strong  yearning  to  see  is  the  spot  where  the  Saviour  was 
crucified-    But  this  they  exhibit  last.    It  is  the  crowning  glory 
of  the  place.    One  is  grave  and  thoughtful  when  he  stands  in 
the  little  Tomb  of  the  Saviour — he  could  not  well  be  otherwise 
in  such  a  place — but  he  has  not  the  slightest  possible  belief  that 
ever  the  Lord  lay  there,  and  so  the  interest  he  feels  in  the  spot 
is  very,  very  greatly  marred  by  that  reflection.    He  looks  at  the 
place  where  Mary  stood,  in  another  part  of  the  church,  and 
where  John  stood,  and  Mary  Magdalen ;  where  the  mob  derided 
the  Lord ;  where  the  angel  sat ;  where  the  crown  of  thorns  was 
found,  and  the  true  cross ;  where  the  risen  Saviour  appeared — he 
looks  at  all  these  places  with  interest,  but  with  the  same  convic 
tion  he  felt  in  the  case  of  the  Sepulcher,  that  there  is  nothing 
genuine  about  them,  and  that  they  are  imaginary  holy  places 
created  by  the  monks.    But  the  place  of  the  ^Crucifixion  affects, 
him  differently.     He  fully  believes  that  he  is   looking  upon 
the  very  spot  where  the  Saviour  gave  up  his  life.     He  re 
members  that  Christ  was  very  celebrated,  long  before  he  came  to 
Jerusalem;  he  knows  that  his  fame  was  so  great  that  crowds 
followed  him  all  the  time ;  he  is  aware  that  his  entry  into  the 
city  produced  a  stirring  sensation,  and  that  his  reception  was 
a  kind  of  ovation;  he  cannot  overlook  the  fact  that  when  he 
was  crucified  there  were  very  many  in  Jerusalem  who  believed 
that  he  was  the  true  Son  of  God.     To  publicly  execute  such 
a  personage  was  sufficient  in  itself  to  make  the  locality  of  the 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  409 

execution  a  memorable  place  for  ages ;  added  to  this,  the  storm, 
the  darkness,  the  earthquake,  the  rending  of  the  veil  of  the 
Temple,  and  the  untimely  waking  of  the  dead,  were  events 
calculated  to  fix  the  execution  and  the  scene  of  it  in  the  memory 
of  even  the  most  thoughtless  witness.  Fathers  would  tell  their 
sons  about  the  strange  affair,  and  point  out  the  spot ;  the  sons 
would  transmit  the  story  to  their  children,  and  thus  a  period 
of  three  hundred  years  would  easily  be  spanned1 — at  which 
time  .Helena  came  and  built  a  church  upon  Calvary  to  commem 
orate  the  death  and  burial  of  the  Lord  and  preserve  the  sacred 
place  in  the  memories  of  men ;  since  that  time  there  has  always 
been  a  church  there.  It  is  not  possible  that  there  can  be  any 
mistake  about  the  locality  of  the  Crucifixion.  Not  half  a  dozen 
persons  knew  where  they  buried  the  Saviour,  perhaps,  and  a 
burial  is  not  a  startling  event,  anyhow;  therefore,  we  can  be 
pardoned  for  unbelief  in  the  Sepulcher,  but  not  in  the  place 
of  the  Crucifixion.  Five  hundred  years  hence  there  will  be 
no  vestige  of  Bunker  Hill  Monument  left,  but  America  will 
still  know  where  the  battle  was  fought  and  where  Warren  fell. 
The  crucifixion  of  Christ  was  too  notable  an  event  in  Jerusalem, 
and  the  Hill  of  Calvary  made  too  celebrated  by  it,  to  be  for 
gotten  in  the  short  space  of  three  hundred  years.  I  climbed 
the  stairway  in  the  church  which  brings  one  to  the  top  of  the 
small  inclosed  pinnacle  of  rock,  and  looked  upon  the  place 
where  the  true  cross  once  stood,  with  a  far  more  absorbing 
interest  than  I  had  ever  felt  in  anything  earthly  before.  I 
could  not  believe  that  the  three  holes  in  the  top  of  the  rock  were 
the  actual  ones  -the  crosses  stood  in,  but  I  felt  satisfied  that 
those  crosses  had  stood  so  near  the  place  now  occupied  by  them, 
that  the  few  feet  of  possible  difference  were  a  matter  of 
no  consequence. 

When  one  stands  where  the  Saviour  was  crucified,  he  finds 
it  all  he  can  do  to  keep  it  strictly  before  his  mind  that  Christ 
was  not  crucified  in  a  Catholic  church.  He  must  remind  him 
self  every  now  and  then  that  the  great  event  transpired  in  the 
open  air,  and  not  in  a  gloomy,  candle-lighted  cell  in  a  little 
corner  of  a  vast  church,  up-stairs — a  small  cell  all  bejeweled 
and  bespangled  with  flashy  ornamentation,  in  execrable  taste. 

1  The  thought  is  Mr.  Prime's,  not  mine,  and  is  full  of  good  sense.  I 
borrowed  it  from  his  Tent  Life. — M.  T. 


410  MARK  TWAIN 

Under  a  marble  altar  like  a  table,  is  a  circular  hole  in  the 
marble  floor,  corresponding  with  the  one  just  under  it  in 
which  the  true  cross  stood.  The  first  thing  every  one  does 
is  to  kneel  down  and  take  a  candle  and  examine  this  hole. 
He  does  this  strange  prospecting  with  an  amount  of  gravity 
that  can  never  be  estimated  or  appreciated  by  a  man  who  has 
not  seen  the  operation.  Then  he  holds  his  candle  before  a 
richly  engraved  picture  of  the  Saviour,  done  on  a  massy  slab 
of  gold,  and  wonderfully  rayed  and  starred  with  diamonds, 
which  hangs  above  the  hole  within  the  altar,  and  his  solemnity 
changes  to  lively  admiration.  He  rises  and  faces  the  finely 
wrought  figures  of  the  Saviour  and  the  malefactors  uplifted 
upon  their  crosses  behind  the  altar,  and  bright  with  a  metallic 
luster  of  many  colors.  He  turns  next  to  the  figures  close  to 
them  of  the  Virgin  and  Mary  Magdalen;  next  to  the  rift  in 
the  living  rock  made  by  the  earthquake  at  the  time  of  the 
crucifixion,  and  an  extension  of  which  he  had  seen  before  in 
the  wall  of  one  of  the  grottoes  below ;  he  looks  at  the  showcase 
with  a  figure  of  the  Virgin  in  it,  and  amazed  at  the  princely 
fortune  in  precious  gems  and  jewelry  that  hangs  so  thickly 
about  the  form  as  to  hide  it  like  a  garment  almost.  All  about 
the  apartment  the  gaudy  trappings  of  the  Greek  church  offend 
the  eye  and  keep  the  mind  on  the  rack  to  remember  that  this 
is  the  Place  of  the  Crucifixion — Golgotha — the  Mount  of 
Calvary.  And  the  last  thing  he  looks  at  is  that  which  was  also 
the  first — the  place  where  the  true  cross  stood.  That  will 
chain  him  to  the  spot  and  compel  him  to  look  once  more,  and 
once  again,  after  he  has  satisfied  all  curiosity  and  lost  all 
interest  concerning  the  other  matters  pertaining  to  the  locality. 

(Xhd  so  I  close  my  chapter  on  the  Church  of  the  Holy 
Sepulcher — the  most  sacred  locality  on  earth  to  millions  and; 
millions  of  men,  and  women,  and  children,  the  noble  and  the 
humble,  bond  and  free.  In  its  history  from  the  first,  and  in 
its  tremendous  associations,  it  is  the  most  illustrious  edifice  in 
Christendom.  With  all  its  claptrap  side-shows  and  unseemly 
impostures  of  every  kind,  it  is  still  grand,  reverend,  venerable — 
for  a  god  died  there ;  for  fifteen  hundred  years  its  shrines  have 
been  wet  with  the  tears  of  pilgrims  from  the  earth's  remotest 
confines ;  for  more  than  two  hundred,  the  most  gallant  knights 
that  ever  wielded  sword  wasted  their  lives  away  in  a  struggle 
to  seize  it  and  hold  it  sacred  from  infidel  pollution.  Even  in 
our  own  day  a  war,  that  cost  millions  of  treasure  and  rivers 
of  blood,  was  fought  because  two  rival  nations  claimed  the  sole 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  411 

right  to  put  a  new  dome  upon  it.  History  is  full  of  this  old 
Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher — full  of  blood  that  was  shed 
because  of  the  respect  and  the  veneration  in  which  men  held 
the  last  resting-place  of  the  meek  and  lowly,  the  mild  and 
gentle  Prince  of  PeaceT) 


CHAPTER  LIV 

WE  were  standing  in  a  narrow  street,  by  the  Tower  of 
Antonio.  "On  these  stones  that  are  crumbling 
away,"  the  guide  said,  "the  Saviour  sat  and  rested 
before  taking  up  the  cross.  This  is  the  beginning  of  the 
Sorrowful  Way,  or  the  Way  of  Grief."  The  party  took  note  of 
the  sacred  spot,  and  moved  on.  We  passed  under  the  "Ecce 
Homo  Arch,"  and  saw  the  very  window  from  which  Pilate's 
wife  warned  her  husband  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  per 
secution  of  the  Just  Man.  The  window  is  in  an  excellent  state 
of  preservation,  considering  its  great  age.  They  showed  us 
where  Jesus  rested  the  second  time,  and  where  the  mob  re 
fused  to  give  him  up,  and  said,  "Let  his  blood  be  upon  our 
heads,  and  upon  our  children's  children  forever."  The  French 
Catholics  are  building  a  church  on  this  spot,  and  with  their 
usual  veneration  for  historical  relics,  are  incorporating  into 
the  new  such  scraps  of  ancient  walls  as  they  have  found  there. 
Further  on,  we  saw  the  spot  where  the  fainting  Saviour  fell 
under  the  weight  of  his  cross.  A  great  granite  column  of 
some  ancient  temple  lay  there  at  the  time,  and  the  heavy  cross 
struck  it  such  a  blow  that  it  broke  in  two  in  the  middle.  Such 
was  the  guide's  story  when  he  halted  us  before  the  broken 
column. 

We  crossed  a  street,  and  came  presently  to  the  fomer  resi 
dence  of  St.  Veronica.  When  the  Saviour  passed  there,  she  j 
came  out,  full  of  womanly  compassion,  and  spoke  pitying  words  ' 
to  him,  undaunted  by  the  hootings  and  the  threatenings  of  the 
mob,  and  wiped  the  perspiration  from  his  face  with  her  hand 
kerchief.  We  had  heard  so  much  of  St.  Veronica,  and  seen 
her  picture  by  so  many  masters,  that  it  was  like  meeting  an  old 
friend  unexpectedly  to  come  upon  her  ancient  home  in  Jeru 
salem.  The  strangest  thing  about  the  incident  that  has  made 
her  name  so  famous,  is,  that  when  she  wiped  the  perspiration 
away,  the  print  of  the  Saviour's  face  remained  upon  the  hand 
kerchief,  a  perfect  portrait,  and  so  remains  unto  this  day. 
We  knew  this,  because  we  saw  this  handkerchief  in  a  cathedral 
in  Paris,  in  another  in  Spain,  and  in  two  others  in  Italv.  In 

412 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  413 

the  Milan  cathedral  it  costs  five  francs  to  see  it,  and  at  St. 
Peter's,  at  Rome,  it  is  almost  impossible  to  see  it  at  any  price. 
No  tradition  is  so  amply  verified  as  this  of  St.  Veronica  and 
her  handkerchief. 

At  the  next  corner  we  saw  a  deep  indentation  in  the  hard 
stone  masonry  of  the  corner  of  a  house,  but  might  have  gone 
heedlessly  by  it  but  that  the  guide  said  it  was  made  by  the 
elbow  of  the  Saviour,  who  stumbled  here  and  fell.  Presently 
we  came  to  just  such  another  indentation  in  a  stone  wall.  The 
guide  said  the  Saviour  fell  here,  also,  and  made  this  depression 
with  his  elbow. 

There  were  other  places  where  the  Lord  fell,  and  others 
where  he  rested;  but  one  of  the  most  curious  landmarks  of 
ancient  history  we  found  on  this  morning  walk  through  the 
crooked  lanes  that  lead  toward  Calvary,  was  a  certain  stone 
built  into  a  house — a  stone  that  was  so  seamed  and  scarred 
that  it  bore  a  sort  of  grotesque  resemblance  to  the  human 
face.  The  projections  that  answered  for  cheeks  were  worn 
smooth  by  the  passionate  kisses  of  generations  of  pilgrims 
from  distant  lands.  We  asked  "Why?"  The  guide  said  it 
was  because  this  was  one  of  "the  very  stones  of  Jerusalem" 
that  Christ  mentioned  when  he  was  reproved  for  permitting  the 
people  to  cry  "Hosannah !"  when  he  made  his  memorable 
entry  into  the  city  upon  an  ass.  One  of  the  pilgrims  said, 
"But  there  is  no  evidence  that  the  stones  did  cry  out — Christ 
said  that  if  the  people  stopped  from  shouting  Hosannah,  the 
very  stones  would  do  it."  The  guide  was  perfectly  serene.  He 
said,  calmly,  "This  is  one  of  the  stones  that  would  have  cried 
out."  It  was  of  little  use  to  try  to  shake  this  fellow's  simple 
faith — it  was  easy  to  see  that. 

And  so  we  came  at  last  to  another  wonder,  of  deep  and 
abiding  interest — the  veritable  house  where  the  unhappy 
wretch  once  lived  who  has  been  celebrated  in  song  and  story 
for  more  than  eighteen  hundred  years  as  the  Wandering  Jew. 
On  the  memorable  day  of  the  Crucifixion  he  stood  in  this  old 
doorway  with  his  arms  akimbo,  looking  out  upon  the  struggling 
mob  that  was  approaching,  and  when  the  weary  Saviour  would 
have  sat  down  and  rested  him  a  moment,  pushed  him  rudely 
away  and  said,  "Move  on !"  The  Lord  said,  "Move  on,  thou, 
likewise,"  and  the  command  has  never  been  revoked  from  that 
day  to  this.  All  men  know  how  that  the  miscreant  upon  whose 
head  that  just  curse  fell  has  roamed  up  and  down  the  wide 
world,  for  ages  and  ages,  seeking  rest  and  never  finding  it — 


414  MARK  TWAIN 

courting  death  but  always  in  vain— longing  to  stop,  in  city,  in 
wilderness,  in  desert  solitudes,  yet  hearing  always  that  re 
lentless  warning  to  march — march  on!  They  say— do  these 
hoary  traditions— that  when  Titus  sacked  Jerusalem  and 
slaughtered  eleven  hundred  thousand  Jews  in  her  streets  and 
byways,  the  Wandering  Jew  was  seen  always  in  the  thickest 
of  the  fight,  and  that  when  battle-axes  gleamed  in  the  air,  he 
bowed  his  head  beneath  them;  when  swords  flashed  their 
deadly  lightnings,  he  sprang  in  their  way;  he  bared  his  breast 
to  whizzing  javelins,  to  hissing  arrows,  to  any  and  to  every 
weapon  that  promised  death  and  forgetfulness,  and  rest.  But 
it  was  useless — he  walked  forth  out  of  the  carnage  without 
a  wound.  And  it  is  said  that  five  hundred  years  afterward  he 
followed  Mohammed  when  he  carried  destruction  to  the  cities 
of  Arabia,  and  then  turned  against  him,  hoping  in  this  way  to 
win  the  death  of  a  traitor.  His  calculations  were  wrong  again. 
No  quarter  was  given  to  any  living  creatures  but  one,  and  that 
was  the  only  one  of  all  the  host  that  did  not  want  it.  He 
sought  death  five  hundred  years  later,  in  the  wars  of  the  Cru 
sades,  and  offered  himself  to  famine  and  pestilence  at  Ascalon. 
He  escaped  again — he  could  not  die.  These  repeated  annoy 
ances  could  have  at  last  but  one  effect — they  shook  his  con 
fidence.  Since  then  the  Wandering  Jew  has  carried  on  a  kind 
of  desultory  toying  with  the  most  promising  of  the  aids  and 
implements  of  destruction,  but  with  small  hope,  as  a  general 
thing.  He  has  speculated  some  in  cholera  and  railroads,  and 
has  taken  almost  a  lively  interest  in  infernal  machines  and 
patent  medicines.  He  is  old,  now,  and  grave,  as  becomes  art 
age  like  his;  he  indulges  in  no  light  amusements  save  that  he 
goes  sometimes  to  executions,  and  is  fond  of  funerals. 

There  is  one  thing  he  cannot  avoid ;  go  where  he  will  about 
the  world,  he  must  never  fail  to  report  in  Jerusalem  every 
fiftieth  year.  Only  a  year  or  two  ago  he  was  here  for  the 
thirty-seventh  time  since  Jesus  was  crucified  on  Calvary.  They 
say  that  many  old  people,  who  are  here  now,  saw  him  then, 
and  had  seen  him  before.  He  looks  always  the  same — old, 
and  withered,  and  hollow-eyed,  and  listless, 'save  that  there  is 
about  him  something  which  seems  to  suggest  that  he  is  looking 
for  some  one,  expecting  some  one — the  friends  of  his  youth, 
perhaps.  But  the  most  of  them  are  dead,  now.  He  always 
pokes  about  the  old  street's  looking  lonesome,  making  his  mark 
on  a  well  here  and  there,  and  eying  the  oldest  buildings  with 
a  sort  of  friendly  half-interest;' and  he  sheds  a  few  tears  at 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  415 

the  threshold  of  his  ancient  dwelling,  and  bitter,  bitter  tears 
they  are.  Then  he  collects  his  rent  and  leaves  again.  He  has 
been  seen  standing  near  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher  on 
many  a  starlight  night,  for  he  has  cherished  an  idea  for  many 
centuries  that  if  he  could  only  enter  there,  he  could  rest.  But 
when  he  approaches,  the  doors  slam  to  with  a  crash,  the  earth 
trembles,  and  all  the  lights  in  Jerusalem  burn  a  ghastly  blue ! 
He  does  this  every  fifty  years,  just  the  same.  It  is  hopeless, 
but  then  it  is  hard  to  break  habits  one  has  been  eighteen  hun 
dred  years  accustomed  to.  The  old  tourist  is  far  away  on  his 
wanderings,  now.  How  he  must  smile  to  see  a  pack  of  block 
heads  like  us,  galloping  about  the  world,  and  looking  wise,  and 
imagining  we  are  rinding  out  a  good  deal  about  it !  He  must 
have  a  consuming  contempt  for  the  ignorant,  complacent  asses 
that  go  scurrying  about  the  world  in  these  railroading  days 
and  call  it  traveling. 

When  the  guide  pointed  out  where  the  Wandering  Jew  had 
left  his  familiar  mark  upon  a  wall,  I  was  filled  with  astonish 
ment.  It  read : 

S.  T.— 1860— X. 

All  I  have  revealed  about  the  Wandering  Jew  can  be  amply 
proven  by  reference  to  our  guide. 

The  mighty  Mosque  of  Omar,  and  the  paved  court  around  it, 
occupy  a  fourth  part  of  Jerusalem.  They  are  upon  Mount 
Moriah,  where  King  Solomon's  Temple  stood.  This  Mosque 
is  the  holiest  place  the  Mohammedan  knows,  outside  of  Mecca. 
Up  to  within  a  year  or  two  past,  no  Christian  could  gain  ad 
mission  to  it  or  its  court  for  love  or  money.  But  the  prohibi 
tion  has  been  removed,  and  we  entered  freely  for  bucksheesh. 

I  need  not  speak  of  the  wonderful  beauty  and  the  exquisite 
grace  and  symmetry  that  have  made  this  Mosque  so  celebrated 
—because  I  did  not  see  them.  One  cannot  see  such  things  at 
an  instant  glance — one  frequently  only  finds  out  how  really 
beautiful  a  really  beautiful  woman  is  after  considerable  ac 
quaintance  with  her;  and  the  rule  applies  to  Niagara  Falls,  to 
majestic  mountains,  and  to  mosques — especially  to  mosques. 

The  great  feature  of  the  Mosque  of  Omar  is  the  prodigious 
rock  in  the  center  of  its  rotunda.  It  was  upon  this  rock  that 
Abraham  came  so  near  offering  up  his  son  Isaac — this,  at 
least,  is  authentic — it  is  very  much  more  to  be  relied  on  than 
most  of  the  traditions,  at  any  rate.  On  this  rock,  the  angel 


416  MARK  TWAIN 

stood  and  threatened  Jerusalem,  and  David  persuaded  him  to 
spare  the  city.  Mohammed  was  well  acquainted  with  this 
stone.  From"  it  he  ascended  to  heaven.  The  stone  tried  to 
follow  him,  and  if  the  angel  Gabriel  had  not  happened  by  the 
merest  good  luck  to  be  there  to  seize  it,  it  would  have  done  it. 
Very  few  people  have  a  grip  like  Gabriel — the  prints  of  his 
monstrous  fingers,  two  inches  deep,  are  to  be  seen  in  that  rock 

to-day. 

This  rock,  large  as  it  is,  is  suspended  in  the  air.^  It  does 
not  touch  anything  at  all.  The  guide  said  so.  This  is  very 
wonderful.  In  the  place  on  it  where  Mohammed  stood,  he 
left  his  footprints  in  the  solid  stone.  I  should  judge  that  he 
wore  about  eighteens.  But  what  I  was  going  to  say,  when  I 
spoke  of  the  rock  being  suspended,  was,  that  in  the  floor  of 
the  cavern  under  it  they  showed  us  a  slab  which  they  said 
covered  a  hole  which  was  a  thing  of  extraordinary  interest  to 
all  Mohammedans,  because  that  hole  leads  down  to  perdition, 
and  every  soul  that  is  transferred  from  thence  to  Heaven  must 
pass  up  through  this  orifice.  Mohammed  stands  there  and 
lifts  them  out  by  the  hair.  All  .Mohammedans  shave  their 
heads,  but  they  are  careful  to  leave  a  lock  of  hair  for  the 
Prophet  to  take  hold  of.  Our  guide  observed  that  a  good 
Mohammedan  would  consider  himself  doomed  to  stay  with  the 
damned  forever  if  he  were  to  lose  his  scalp-lock  and  die  before 
it  grew  again.  The  most  of  them  that  I  have  seen  ought  to 
stay  with  the  damned,  anyhow,  without  reference  to  how  they 
were  barbered. 

For  several  ages  no  woman  has  been  allowed  to  enter  the 
cavern  where  that  important  hole  is.  The  reason  is  that  one 
of  the  sex  was  once  caught  there  blabbing  everything  she  knew 
about  what  was  going  on  above-ground,  to  the  rapscallion  in 
the  infernal  regions  down  below.  She  carried  her  gossiping  to 
such  an  extreme  that  nothing  could  be  kept  private — nothing 
could  be  done  or  said  on  earth  but  everybody  in  perdition 
knew  all  about  it  before  the  sun  went  down.  It  was  about 
time  to  suppress  this  woman's  telegraph,  and  it  was  promptly 
done.  Her  breath  subsided  about  the  same  time. 

The  inside  of  the  great  mosque  is  very  showy  with  -va 
riegated  marble  walls  and  with  windows  and  inscriptions  of  elab 
orate  mosaic.  The  Turks  have  their  sacred  relics,  like  the 
Catholics.  The  guide  showed  us  the  veritable  armor  worn  by 
the  great  son-in-law  and  successor  of  Mohammed,  and  also  the 
buckler  of  Mohammed's  uncle.  The  great  iron  railing  which 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  417 

surrounds  the  rock  was  ornamented  in  one  place  with  a  thou 
sand  rags  tied  to  its  open  work.  These  are  to  remind  Moham 
med  not  to  forget  the  worshipers  who  placed  them  there.  It 
is  considered  the  next  best  thing  to  tying  threads  around  his 
finger  by  way  of  reminders.  f 

Just  outside  the  mosque  is  a  miniature  temple,  which  marks 
the.  spot  where  David  and  Goliah  used  to  sit  and  judge  the 
people.1 

Everywhere  about  the  Mosque  of  Omar  are  portions  of  pil 
lars,  curiously  wrought  altars,  and  fragments  of  elegantly 
carved  marble — precious  remains  of  Solomon's  Temple.  These 
have  been  dug  from  all  depths  in  the  soil  and  rubbish  of  Mount 
Moriah,  and  the  Moslems  have  always  shown  a  disposition  to 
preserve  them  with  the  utmost  care.  At  that  portion  of  the 
ancient  wall  of  Solomon's  Temple  which  is  called  the  Jew's 
Place  of  Wailing,  and  where  the  Hebrews  assemble  every 
Friday  to  kiss  the  venerated  stones  and  weep  over  the  fallen 
greatness  of  Zion,  any  one  can  see  a  part  of  the  unquestioned 
and  undisputed  Temple  of  Solomon,  the  same  consisting  of 
three  or  four  stones  lying  one  upon  the  other,  each  of  which 
is  about  twice  as  long  as  a  seven-octave  piano,  and  about  as 
thick  as  such  a  piano  is  high.  But,  as  I  have  remarked  before, 
it  is  only  a  year  or  two  ago  that  the  ancient  edict  prohibiting 
Christian  rubbish  like  ourselves  to  enter  the  Mosque  of  Omar 
and  see  the  costly  marbles  that  once  adorned  the  inner  Temple 
was  annulled.  The  designs  wrought  upon  these  fragments  are 
all  quaint  and  peculiar,  and  so  the  charm  of  novelty  is  added 
to  the  deep  interest  they  naturally  inspire.  One  meets  with 
these  venerable  scraps  at  every  turn,  especially  in  the  neighbor 
ing  Mosque  el  Aksa,  into  whose  inner  walls  a  very  large  num 
ber  of  them  are  carefully  built  for  preservation.  These  pieces 
of  stone,  stained  and  dusty  with  age,  dimly  hint  at  a  grandeur 
we  have  all  been  taught  to  regard  as  the  princeliest  ever  seen 
on  earth:  and  they  call  up  pictures  of  a  pageant  that  is  famil 
iar  to  all  imaginations — camels  laden  with  spices  and  treasure — 
beautiful  slaves,  presents  for  Solomon's  harem — a  long  cav 
alcade  of  richly  caparisoned  beasts  and  warriors — and  Sheba's 
Queen  in  the  van  of  this  vision  of  "Oriental  magnificence." 

*A  pilgrim  informs  me  that  it  was  not  David  and  Goliath,  but  David 
and  Saul.  I  stick  to  my  own  statement — the  guide  told  me,  and  he 
ought  to  know. 


418  MARK  TWAIN 

These  elegant  fragments  bear  a  richer  interest  than  the  solemn 
vastness  of  the  stones  the  Jews  kiss  in  the  Place  of  Wailing 
can  ever  have  for  the  heedless  sinner. 

Down  in  the  hollow  ground,  underneath  the  olives  and  the 
orange  trees  that  flourish  in  the  court  of  the  great  Mosque,  is 
a  wilderness  of  pillars — remains  of  the  ancient  Temple;  they 
supported  it.  There  are  ponderous  archways  down  there,  also, 
over  which  the  destroying  "plow"  of  prophecy  passed  harmless. 
It  is  pleasant  to  know  we  are  disappointed,  in  that  we  never 
dreamed  we  might  see  portions  of  the  actual  Temple  of  Sol 
omon,  and  yet  experience  no  shadow  of  suspicion  that  they  were 
a  monkish  humbug  and  a  fraud. 

We  are  surfeited  with  sights.  Nothing  has  any  fascination 
for  us,  now,  but  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher.  We  have 
been  there  every  day,  and  havejiot  grown  tired  of  it;  but  we 
are  weary  of  everything  else.  (The  sights  are  too  many.  They 
swarm  about  you  at  every  step;  no  single  foot  of  ground  in 
all  Jerusalem  or  within  its  neighborhood  seems  to  be  without 
a  stirring  and  important  history  of  its  own.  It  is  a  very  re 
lief  to  steal  a  walk  of  a  hundred  yards  without  a  guide  along 
to  talk  unceasingly  about  every  stone  you  step  upon  and  drag 
you  back  ages  and  ages  to  the  day  when  it  achieved  celebrif^J 

It  seems  hardly  real  when  I  find  myself  leaning  for  a  rrfo- 
ment  on  a  ruined  wall  and  looking  listlessly  down  into  the 
historic  pool  of  Bethesda.  I  did  not  think  such  things  could 
be  so  crowded  together  as  to  diminish  their  interest.  But,  in 
serious  truth,  we  have  been  drifting  about,  for  several  days, 
using  our  eyes  and  our  ears  more  from  a  sense  of  duty  than 
any  higher  and  worthier  reason.  And  too  often  we  have  been 
glad  when  it  was  time  to  go  home  and  be  distressed  no  more 
about  illustrious  localities. 

Our  pilgrims  compress  too  much  into  one  day.  One  can 
gorge  sights  to  repletion  as  well  as  sweetmeats.  Since  we 
breakfasted,  this  morning,  we  have  seen  enough  to  have  fur 
nished  us  food  for  a  year's  reflection  if  we  could  have  seen  the 
various  objects  in  comfort  and  looked  upon  them  deliberately. 
We  visited  the  Pool  of  Hezekiah,  where  David  saw  Uriah's 
wife  coming  from  the  bath  and  fell  in  love  with  her. 

We  went  out  of  the  city  by  the  Jaffa  gate,  and  of  course  were 
told  many  things  about  its  Tower  of  Hippicus. 

We  rode  across  the  Valley  of  Hinnom,  between  two  of  the 
Pools  of  Gihon,  and  by  an  aqueduct  built  by  Solomon,  which 
still  conveys  water  to  the  city.  We  ascended  the  Hill  of  Evil 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  419 

Counsel,  where  Judas  received  his  thirty  pieces  of  silver,  and 
we  also  lingered  a  moment  under  the  tree  a  venerable  tradi 
tion  says  he  hanged  himself  on. 

We  descended  to  the  canon  again,  and  then  the  guide  began 
to  give  name  and  history  to  every  bank  and  boulder  we  came 
to:  "This  was  the  Field  of  Blood;  these  cuttings  in  the  rocks 
were  shrines  and  temples  of  Moloch ;  here  they  sacrificed  chil 
dren;  yonder  is  the  Zion  Gate;  the  Tyropean  Valley;  the  Hill 
of  Ophel;  here  is  the  junction  of  the  Valley  of  Jehoshaphat — 
on  your  right  is  the  Well  of  Job."  We  turned  to  Jehoshaphat. 
The  recital  went  on. 

"This  is  the  Mount  of  Olives;  this  is  the  Hill  of  Offense; 
the  nest  of  huts  is  the  Village  of  Siloam ;  here,  yonder,  every 
where,  is  the  King's  Garden;  under  this  great  tree  Zacharias, 
the  high  priest,  was  murdered ;  yonder  is  Mount  Moriah  and 
.the  Temple  wall ;  the  tomb  of  Absalom ;  the  tomb  of  St.  James ; 
the  tomb  of  Zacharias ;  beyond,  are  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane 
and  the  tomb  of  the  Virgin  Mary ;  here  is  the  Pool  of  Siloam, 
and— " 

We  said  we  would  dismount,  and  quench  our  thirst,  and  rest. 
We  were  burning  up  with  the  heat.  We  were  failing  under 
the  accumulated  fatigue  of  days  and  days  of  ceaseless  march 
ing.  All  were  willing. 

The  Pool  is  a  deep,  walled  ditch,  through  which  a  clear 
stream  of  water  runs,  that  comes  from  under  Jerusalem  some 
where,  and  passing  through  the  Fountain  of  the  Virgin,  or 
being  supplied  from  it,  reaches  this  place  by  way  of  a  tunnel 
of  heavy  masonry.  The  famous  pool  looked  exactly  as  it 
looked  in  Solomon's  time,  no  doubt,  and  the  same  dusky, 
Oriental  women  came  down  in  their  old  Oriental  way  and 
carried  off  jars  of  the  water  on  their  heads,  just  as  they  did 
three  thousand  years  ago,  and  just  as  they  will  do  fifty 
thousand  years  hence  if  any  of  them  are  still  left  on  earth. 

We  went  away  from  there  and  stopped  at  the  Fountain 
of  the  Virgin.  But  the  water  was  not  good,  and  there  was  no 
comfort  or  peace  anywhere,  on  account  of  the  regiment  of 
boys  and  girls  and  beggars  that  persecuted  us  all  the  time  for 
bucksheesh.  The  guide  wanted  us  to  give  them  some  money, 
and  we  did  it;  but  when  he  went  on  to  say  that  they  were 
starving  to  death  we  could  not  but  feel  that  we  had  done  a 
great  sin  in  throwing  obstacles  in  the  way  of  such  a  desirable 
consummation,  and  so  we  tried  to  collect  it  back,  but  it  could 
not  be  done. 


420  MARK  TWAIN 

We  entered  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane,  and  we  visited 
the  Tomb  of  Virgin,  both  of  which  we  had  seen  before.  It 
is  not  meet  that  I  should  speak  of  them  now.  A  more  fitting 
time  will  come. 

I  cannot  speak  now  of  the  Mount  of  Olives  or  its  view  of 
Jerusalem,  the  Dead  Sea,  and  mountains  of  Moab;  nor  of  the 
Damascus  Gate  or  the  tree  that  was  planted  by  King  Godfrey  of 
Jerusalem.  One  ought  to  feel  pleasantly  when  he  talks  of  these 
tilings.  I  cannot  say  anything  about  the  stone  column  that 
projects  over  Jehoshaphat  from  the  Temple  wall  like  a  cannon, 
except  that  the  Moslems  believe  Mohammed  will  sit  astride 
of  it  when  he  comes  to  judge  the  world.  It  is  a  pity  he  could 
not  judge  it  from  some  roost  of  his  own  in  Mecca,  without 
trespassing  on  our  holy  ground.  Close  by  is  the  Golden  Gate, 
in  the  Temple  wall — a  gate  that  was  an  elegant  piece  of  Sculp 
ture  in  the  time  of  the  Temple,  and  is  even  so  yet.  From  it, 
in  ancient  times,  the  Jewish  High  Priest  turned  loose  the 
scapegoat  and  let  him  flee  to  the  wilderness  and  bear  away  his 
twelvemonth  load  of  the  sins  of  the  people.  If  they  were  to 
turn  one  loose  now,  he  would  not  get  as  far  as  the  Garden  of 
Gethsemane,  till  these  miserable  vagabonds  here  would  gobble 
him  up,1  sins  and  all.  They  wouldn't  care.  Mutton-chops  and 
sin  is  good  enough  living  for  them.  The  Moslems  watch 
the  Golden  Gate  with  a  jealous  eye,  and  an  anxious  one,  for 
they  have  an  honored  tradition  that  when  it  falls,  Islamism 
will  fall,  and  with  it  the  Ottoman  Empire.  It  did  not  grieve 
me  any  to  notice  that  the  old  gate  was  getting  a  little  shaky. 

We  are  at  home  again.  We  are  exhausted.  The  sun  has 
roasted  us,  almost. 

VjVe  have  full  comfort  in  one  reflection,  however.  Our 
experiences  in  Europe  have  taught  us  that  in  time  this  fatigue 
will  be  forgotten;  the  heat  will  be  forgotten;  the  thirst,  the 
tiresome  volubility  of  the  guide,  the  persecutions  of  the  beggars 
— and  then,  all  that  will  be  left  will  be  pleasant  memories  of 
Jerusalem,  memories  we  shall  call  up  with  always  increasing 
interest  as  the  years  go  by,  memories  which  some  day  will  be 
come  all  beautiful  when  the  last  annoyance  that  encumbers 
them  shall  have  faded  out  of  our  minds  never  again  to  return^ 
School-boy  days  are  no  happier  than  the  days  of  after  KfC 
but  we  look  back  upon  them  regretfully  because  we  have  for 
gotten  our  punishments  at'  school,  and'  how  we  grieved  when 
our  marbles  were  lost  and  our  kites  destroyed — because 
Favourite  Pilgrim  expression. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  421 

we  have  forgotten  all  the  sorrows  and  privations  of  that 
canonized  epoch  and  remember  only  its  orchard  robberies,  its 
wooden-sword  pageants,  and  its  fishing  holidays.  We  are  satis 
fied.  We  can  wait.  Our  reward  will  come.  To  us,  Jerusalem 
and  to-day's  experiences  will  be  an  enchanted  memory  a  year 
hence — a  memory  which  money  could  not  buy  from  us. 


CHAPTER  LV 

WE  cast  up  the  account.     It  footed  up  pretty  fairly. 
There  was  nothing  more  at  Jerusalem  to  be  seen, 
except  the  traditional  houses  of  Dives  and  Lazarus 
of  the  parable,  the  Tombs  of  the  Kings,  and  those  of  the 
Judges;  the  spot  where  they  stoned  one  of  the  disciples  to 
death,  and  beheaded  another;  the  room  and  the  table  made, 
celebrated  by  the  Last  Supper;  the  fig  tree  that  Jesus  with 
ered;   a  number  of   historical   places   about   Gethsemane   and 
the  Mount  of  Olives,  and  fifteen  or  twenty  others  in  different 
portions  of  the  city  itself. 

We  were  approaching  the  end.  Human  nature  asserted 
itself,  now.  Overwork  and  consequent  exhaustion  began  to 
have  their  natural  effect.  They  began  to  master  the  energies 
and  dull  the  ardor  of  the  party.  Perfectly  secure  now  against 
failing  to  accomplish  any  detail  of  the  pilgrimage,  they  felt 
like  drawing  in  advance  upon  the  holiday  soon  to  be  placed  to 
their  credit.  They  grew  a  little  lazy.  They  were  late  to  break 
fast  and  sat  long  at  dinner.  Thirty  or  forty  pilgrims  had 
arrived  ^f  rom  the  ship,  by  the  short  routes,  and  much  swapping 
of  gossip  had  to  be  indulged  in.  And  in  hot  afternoons,  they 
showed  a  strong  disposition  to  lie  on  the  cool  divans  in  the 
hotel  and  smoke  and  talk  about  pleasant  experiences  of  a 
month  or  so  gone  by — for  even  thus  early  do  episodes  of 
travel  which  were  sometimes  annoying,  sometimes  exasperat 
ing,  and  full  as  often  of  no  consequence  at  all  when  they 
transpired,  begin  to  rise  above  the  dead  level  of  monotonous 
reminiscences  and'  become  shapely  landmarks  in  one's  memory. 
The  fog-whistle,  smothered  among  a  million  of  trifling  sounds, 
is  not  noticed  a  block  away,  in  the  city,  but  the  sailor  hears  it 
far  at  sea,  whither  none  of  those  thousands  of  trifling  sounds 
can  reach.  When  one  is  in  Rome,  all  the  domes  are  alike; 
but  when  he  has  gone  away  twelve  miles,  the  city  fades  utterly 
from  sight  and  leaves  St.  Peter's  swelling  above  the  level 
plain  like  an  anchored  balloon.  When  one  is  traveling  in 
Europe,  the  daily  incidents 'seem  all  alike;  but  when  he  has 
placed  them  all  two  months  and  two  thousand  miles  behind 

422 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  423 

him,  those  that  are  worthy  of  being  remembered  are  promi 
nent,  and  those  that  were  really  insignificant  have  vanished. 
This  disposition  to  smoke  and  idle  and  talk  was  not  well.  It 
was  plain  that  it  must  not  be  allowed  to  gain  ground.  A 
diversion  must  be  tried,  or  demoralization  would  ensue.  The 
Jordan,  Jericho,  and  the  Dead  Sea  were  suggested.  The 
remainder  of  Jerusalem  must  be  left  unvisited,  for  a  little 
while.  The  journey  was  approved  at  once.  New  life  stirred 
in  every  pulse.  In  the  saddle — abroad  on  the  plains — sleeping 
in  beds  bounded  only  by  the  horizon :  fancy  was  at  work  with 
these  things  in  a  moment.  It  was  painful  to  note  how  readily 
these  town-bred  men  had  taken  to  the  free  life  of  the  camp 
and  the  desert.  The  nomadic  instinct  is  a  human  instinct ;  it 
was  born  with  Adam  and  transmitted  through  the  patriarchs-, 
and  after  thirty  centuries  of  steady  effort,  civilization  has  not 
.  educated  it  entirely  out  of  us  yet.  It  has  a  charm  which,  once 
tasted,  a  man  will  yearn  to  taste  again.  The  nomadic  instinct 
cannot  be  educated  out  of  an  Indian  at  all. 

The  Jordan  journey  being  approved,  our  dragoman  was  noti 
fied. 

At  nine  in  the  morning  the  caravan  was  before  the  hotel  door 
and  we  were  at  breakfast.  There  was  a  commotion  about  the 
place.  Rumors  of  war  and  bloodshed  were  flying  everywhere. 
The  lawless  Bedouins  in  the  Valley  of  the  Jordan  and  the 
deserts  down  by  the  Dead  Sea  were  up  in  arms,  and  were  going 
to  destroy  all  comers.  They  had  had  a  battle  with  a  troop  of 
Turkish  cavalry  and  defeated  them ;  several  men  killed.  They 
had  shut  up  the  inhabitants  of  a  village  and  a  Turkish  garrison 
in  an  old  fort  near  Jericho,  and  were  besieging  them.  They  had 
marched  upon  a  camp  of  our  excursionists  by  the  Jordan,  and 
the  pilgrims  only  saved  their  lives  by  stealing  away  and  flying 
to  Jerusalem  under  whip  and  spur  in  the  darkness  of  the  night. 
Another  of  our  parties  had  been  fired  on  from  an  ambush  and 
then  attacked  in  the  open  day.  Shots  were  fired  on  both  sides. 
Fortunately,  there  was  no  bloodshed.  We  spoke  with  the  very 
pilgrim  who  had  fired  one  of  the  shots,  and  learned  from  his 
own  lips  how,  in  this  imminent  deadly  peril,  only  the  cool 
courage  of  the  pilgrims,  their  strength  of  numbers  and  impos 
ing  display  of  war  material,  had  saved  them  from  utter  de 
struction.  It  was  reported  that  the  Consul  had  requested  that 
no  more  of  our  pilgrims  should  go  to  the  Jordan  while  this 
state  of  things  lasted;  and  further,  that  he  was  unwilling  that 
any  more  should  go,  at  least  without  an  unusually  strong  mili- 


424  MARK  TWAIN 

tary  guard.  Here  was  trouble.  But  with  the  horses  at  the  door 
and  everybody  aware  of  what  they  were  there  for,  what  would 
you  have  done?  Acknowledged  that  you  were  afraid,  and 
backed  shamefully  out?  Hardly.  It  would  not  be  human 
nature,  where  there  were  so  many  women.  You  would  have 
done  as  we  did:  said  you  were  not  afraid  of  a  million  Bed 
ouins — and  made  your  will  and  proposed  quietly  to  yourself 
to  take  up  an  unostentatious  position  in  the  rear  of  the  pro 
cession. 

I  think  we  must  all  have  determined  upon  the  same  line  of 
tactics,  for  it  did  seem  as  if  we  never  would  get  to  Jericho.  I 
had  a  notoriously  slow  horse,  but  somehow  I  could  not  keep 
him  in  the  rear,  to  save  my  neck.  He  was  forever  turning  up 
in  the  lead.  In  such  cases  I  trembled  a  little,  and  got  down 
to  fix  my  saddle.  But  it  was  not  of  any  use.  The  others  all 
got  down  to  fix  their  saddles,  too.  I  never  saw  such  a  time  with 
saddles.  It  was  the  first  time  any  of  them  had  got  out  of  order 
in  three  weeks,  and  now  they  had  all  broken  down  at  once,  I 
tried  walking,  for  exercise — I  had  not  had  enough  in  Jeru 
salem  searching  for  holy  places.  But  it  was  a  failure.  The 
whole  mob  were  suffering  for  exercise,  and  it  was  not  fifteen 
minutes  till  they  were  ail  on  foot  and  I  had  the  lead  again.  It 
was  very  discouraging. 

This  was  all  after  we  got  beyond  Bethany.  We  stopped 
at  the  village  of  Bethany,  an  hour  out  from  Jerusalem.  They 
showed  us  the  tomb  of  Lazarus.  I  had  rather  live  in  it  than 
in  any  house  in  the  town.  And  they  showed  us  also  a  large 
"Fountain  of  Lazarus,"  and  in  the  center  of  the  village  the 
ancient  dwelling  of  Lazarus.  Lazarus  appears  to  have  been  a 
man  of  property.  The  legends  of  the  Sunday-schools  do  him 
great  injustice;  they  give  one  the  impression  that  he  was  poor. 
It  is  because  they  get  him  confused  with  that  Lazarus  who  had 
no  merit  but  his  virtue,  and  virtue  never  has  been  as  respect 
able  as  money.  The  house  of  Lazarus  is  a  three-story  edifice, 
of  stone  masonry,  but  the  accumulated  rubbish  of  ages  has 
buried  all  of  it  but  the  upper  story.  We  took  candles  and 
descended  to  the  dismal  cell-like  chambers  where  Jesus  sat  at 
meat  with  Martha  and  Mary,  and  conversed  with  them  about 
their  brother.  We  could  not  but  look  upon  these  old  dingy 
apartments  with  a  more  than  common  interest. 
^  We  had  had  a  glimpse,  from  a  mountain-top,  of  the  Dead 
Sea,  lying  like  a  blue  shield  in  the  plain  of  the  Jordan,  and  now 
we  were  marching  down  a  close  flaming,  rugged,  desolate  defile, 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  425 

where  no  living  creature  could  enjoy  life,  except,  perhaps,  a 
salamander.  It  was  such  a  dreary,  repulsive,  horrible  solitude ! 
It  was  the  "wilderness"  where  John  preached,  with  camel's 
hair  about  his  loins — raiment  enough — but  he  never  could  have 
got  his  locusts  and  wild  honey  here.  We  were  moping  along 
down  through  this  dreadful  place,  every  man  in  the  rear.  Our 
guards — two  gorgeous  young  Arab  sheiks,  with  cargoes  of 
swords,  guns,  pistols,  and  daggers  on  board — were  loafing 
ahead. 

"Bedouins !" 

Every  man  shrunk  up  and  disappeared  in  his  clothes  like  a 
mud-turtle.  My  first  impulse  was  to  dash  forward  and  de 
stroy  the  Bedouins.  My  second  was  to  dash  to  the  rear  to  see 
if  there  were  any  coming  in  that  direction.  I  acted  on  the 
latter  impulse.  So  did  all  the  others.  If  any  Bedouins  had  ap 
proached  us,  then,  from  that  point  of  the  compass,  they  would 
have  paid  dearly  for  their  rashness.  We  all  remarked  that 
afterward.  There  would  have  been  scenes  of  riot  and  blood 
shed  there  that  no  pen  could  describe.  I  know  that,  because 
each  man  told  what  he  would  have  done,  individually ;  and  such 
a  medley  of  strange  and  unheard-of  inventions  of  cruelty  you 
could  not  conceive  of.  One  man  said  he  had  calmly  made  up 
his  mind  to  perish  where  he  stood,  if  need  be,  but  never  yield 
an  inch;  he  was  going  to  wait,  with  deadly  patience,  till  he 
could  count  the  stripes  upon  the  first  Bedouin's  jacket,  and 
then  count  them  and  let  him  have  it.  Another  was  going  to 
sit  still  till  the  first  lance  reached  within  an  inch  of  his 
breast,  and  then  dodge  it  and  seize  it.  I  forbear  to  tell  what 
he  was  going  to  do  to  that  Bedouin  that  owned  it.  It  makes 
my  blood  run  cold  to  think  of  it.  Another  was  going  to  scalp 
such  Bedouins  as  fell  to  his  share,  and  take  his  bald-headed 
sons  of  the  desert  home  with  him  alive  for  trophies.  But  the 
wild-eyed  pilgrim  rhapsodist  was  silent.  His  orbs  gleamed 
with  a  deadly  light,  but  his  lips  moved  not.  Anxiety  grew, 
and  he  was  questioned.  If  he  had  got  a  Bedouin,  what  would 
he  have  done  with  him — shot  him?  He  smiled  a  smile  of  grim 
contempt  and  shook  his  head.  Would  he  have  stabbed  him? 
Another  shake.  Would  he  have  quartered  him — flayed  him? 
More  shakes.  Oh!  horror,  what  would  he  have  done? 

"Eat  him !" 

Such  was  the  awful  sentence  that  thundered  from  his  lips. 
What  was  grammar  to  a  desperado  like  that?  I  was  glad  in 
my  heart  that  I  had  been  spared  these  scenes  of  malignant 


426  MARK  TWAIN 

carnage.  No  Bedouins  attacked  our  terrible  rear.  And  none 
attacked  the  front.  The  new-comers  were  only  a  reinforcement 
of  cadaverous  Arabs,  in  shirts  and  bare  legs,  sent  far  ahead 
of  us  to  brandish  rusty  guns,  and  shout  and  brag,  and  carry 
on  like  lunatics,  and  thus  scare  away  all  bands  of  marauding 
Bedouins  that  might  lurk  about  our  path.  What  a  shame  it  is 
that  armed  white  Christians  must  travel  under  guard  of  ver 
min  like  this  as  a  protection  against  the  prowling  vagabonds  of 
the  desert — those  sanguinary  outlaws  who  are  always  going  to 
do  something  desperate,  but  never  do  it.  I  may  as  well  men 
tion  here  that  on  our  whole  trip  we  saw  no  Bedouins,  and  had 
no  more  use  for  an  Arab  guard  than  we  could  have  had  for 
patent-leather  boots  and  white  kid  gloves.  The  Bedouins  that 
attacked  the  other  parties  of  pilgrims  so  fiercely  were  provided 
for  the  occasion  by  the  Arab  guides  of  those  parties,  and 
shipped  from  Jerusalem  for  temporary  service  as  Bedouins, 
They  met  together  in  full  view  of  the  pilgrims,  after  the  bat 
tle,  and  took  lunch,  divided  the  bucksheesh  extorted  in  the  sea 
son  of  danger,  and  then  accompanied  the  cavalcade  home  to 
the  city !  The  nuisance  of  an  Arab  guard  is  one  which  is 
created  by  the  Sheiks  and  the  Bedouins  together,  for  mutual 
profit,  it  is  said,  and  no  doubt  there  is  a  good  deal  of  truth  in 
it. 

We  visited  the  fountain  the  prophet  Elisha  sweetened  (it  is 
sweet  yet)  ;  where  he  remained  some  time  and  was  fed  by  the 
ravens. 

Ancient  Jericho  is  not  very  picturesque  as  a  ruin.  When 
Joshua  marched  around  it  seven  times,  some  three  thousand 
years  ago,  and  blew  it  down  with  his  trumpet,  he  did  the  work 
so  well  and  so  completely  that  he  hardly  left  enough  of  the  city 
to  cast  a  shadow.  The  curse  pronounced  against  the  rebuild-  i 
ing  of  it  has  never  been  removed.  One  king,  holding  the  curse 
in  light  estimation,  made  the  attempt,  but  was  stricken  sorely 
for  his  presumption.  Its  site  will  always  remain  unoccupied; 
and  yet  it  is  one  of  the  very  best  locations  for  a  town  we  have 
seen  in  all  Palestine. 

At  two  in  the  morning  they  routed  us  out  of  bed — another 
piece  of  unwarranted  cruelty,  another  stupid  effort  of  our 
dragoman  to  get  ahead  of  a  rival.  It  was  not  two  hours  to  the 
Jordan.  However,  we  were  dressed  and  under  way  before 
any  one  thought  of  looking  to  see  what  time  it  was,  and  so 
we  drowsed  on  through  the  chill  night  air  and  dreamed  of 
camp-fires,  warm  beds,  and  other  comfortable  things. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  427 

There  was  no  conversation.  People  do  not  talk  when  they 
are  cold,  and  wretched,  and  sleepy.  We  nodded  in  the  saddle, 
at  times,  and  woke  up  with  a  start  to  find  that  the  procession 
had  disappeared  in  the  gloom.  Then  there  was  energy  and 
attention  to  business  until  its  dusky  oulines  came  in  sight  again. 
Occasionally  the  order  was  passed  in  a  low  voice  down  the 
line :  "Close  up — close  up !  Bedouins  lurk  here,  everywhere  !" 
What  an  exquisite  shudder  it  sent  shivering  along  one's  spine ! 

We  reached  the  famous  river  before  four  o'clock,  and  the 
night  was  so  black  that  we  could  have  ridden  into  it  without 
seeing  it.  Some  of  us  were  in  an  unhappy  frame  of  mind. 
We  waited  and  waited  for  daylight,  but  it  did  not  come. 
Finally  we  went  away  in  the  dark  and  slept  an  hour  on  the 
ground,  in  the  bushes,  and  caught  cold.  It  was  a  costly  nap, 
on  that  account,  but  otherwise  it  was  a  paying  investment 
because  it  brought  unconsciousness  of  the  dreary  minutes  and 
put  us  in  a  somewhat  fitter  mood  for  a  first  glimpse  of  the 
sacred  river. 

With  the  first  suspicion  of  dawn,  every  pilgrim  took  off 
his  clothes  and  waded  into  the  dark  torrent,  singing: 

On    Jordan's    stormy    banks    I    stand, 

And  cast  a  wistful  eye 
To  Canaan's  fair  and  happy  land, 

Where  my  possessions  lie. 

But  they  did  not  sing  long.  The  water  was  so  fearfully 
cold  that  they  were  obliged  to  stop  singing  and  scamper  out 
again.  Then  they  stood  on  the  bank  shivering,  and  as  cha 
grined  and  so  grieved,  that  they  merited  honest  compassion. 
Because  another  dream,  another  cherished  hope,  had  failed. 
They  had  promised  themselves  all  along  that  they  would  cross 
the  Jordan  where  the  Israelites  crossed  it  when  they  entered 
Canaan  from  their  long  pilgrimage  in  the  desert.  They  would 
cross  where  the  twelve  stones  were  placed  in  memory  of  that 
great  event.  While  they  did  it  they  would  picture  to  them 
selves  that  vast  army  of  pilgrims  marching  through  the  cloven 
waters,  bearing  the  hallowed  ark  of  the  covenant  and  shouting 
hosannahs,  and  singing  songs  of  thanksgiving  and  praise.  Each 
had  promised  himself  that  he  would  be  the  first  to  cross.  They 
were  at  the  goal  of  their  hopes  at  last,  but  the  current  was  too 
swift,  the  water  was  too  cold ! 

It  was  then  that  Jack  did  them  a  service.  With  that  engaging 
recklessness  of  consequences  which  is  natural  to  youth,  and  so 


428  MARK  TWAIN 

proper,  so  seemly,  as  well,  he  went  and  led  the  way  across  the 
Jordan,  and  all  was  happiness  again.  Every  individual  waded 
over,  then,  and  stood  upon  the  further  bank.  The  water  was  not 
quite  breast-deep,  anywhere.  If  it  had  been  more,  we  could 
hardly  accomplish  the  feat,  for  the  strong  current  would  have 
swept  us  down  the  stream,  and  we  would  have  been  exhausted 
and  drowned  before  reaching  a  place  where  we  could  make  a 
landing.  The  main  object  compassed,  the  drooping,  miserable 
party  sat  down  to  wait  for  the  sun  again,  for  all  wanted  to  see 
the  water  as  well  as  feel  it.  But  it  was  too  cold  a  pastime. 
Some  cans  were  filled  from  the  holy  river,  some  canes  cut  from 
its  banks,  and  then  we  mounted  and  rode  reluctantly  away  to 
keep  from  freezing  to  death.  Qo  we  saw  the  Jordan  very 
dimly.  The  thickets  of  bushes  tnat  bordered  its  banks  threw 
their  shadows  across  its  shallow,  turbulent  waters  ("stormy," 
the  hymn  makes  them,  which  is  rather  a  complimentary  stretch 
of  fancy),  and  we  could  not  judge  of  the  width  of  the  stream 
by  the  eye.  We  knew  by  our  wading  experience,  however, 
that  many  streets  in  America  are  double  as  wide  as  the  Jordan) 

Daylight  came,  soon  after  we  got  under  way,  and  in  the 
course  of  an  hour  or  two  we  reached  the  Dead  Sea.  Noth 
ing  grows  in  the  flat,  burning  desert  around  it  but  weeds  and 
the  Dead  Sea  apple  the  poets  say  is  beautiful  to  the  eye,  but 
crumbles  to  ashes  and  dust  when  you  break  it.  Such  as  we 
found  were  not  handsome,  but  they  were  bitter  to  the  taste. 
They  yielded  no  dust.  It  was  because  they  were  not  ripe,  per 
haps. 

The  desert  and  the  barren  hills  gleam  painfully  in  the  sun, 
around  the  Dead  Sea,  and  there  is  no  pleasant  thing  or  living- 
creature  upon  it  or  about  its  borders  to  cheer  the  eye.  It  is 
a  scorching,  arid,  repulsive  solitude.  A  silence  broods  over, 
the  scene  that  is  depressing  to  the  spirits.  It  makes  one  think' 
of  funerals  and  death. 

The  Dead  Sea  is  small.  Its  waters  are  very  clear,  and  it 
has  a  pebbly  bottom  and  is  shallow  for  some  distance  out  from 
the  shores.  It  yields  quantities  of  asphaltum ;  fragments  of 
it  lie  all  about  its  banks;  this  stuff  gives  the  place  something 
of  an  unpleasant  smell. 

All  our  reading  had  taught  us  to  expect  that  the  first  plunge 
into  the  Dead  Sea  would  be  attended  with  distressing  results — 
our  bodies  would  feel  as  if  they  were  suddenly  pierced  by  mil 
lions  of  red-hot  needles;  the  dreadful  smarting  would  con 
tinue  for  hours ;  we  might  even  look  to  be  blistered  from  head 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  429 

to  foot,  and  suffer  miserably  for  many  days.  We  were  dis 
appointed.  Our  eight  sprang  in  at  the  same  time  that  another 
party  of  pilgrims  did,  and  nobody  screamed  once.  None  of 
them  ever  did  complain  of  anything  more  than  a  slight  prick 
ing  sensation  in  places  where  their  skin  was  abraded,  and  then 
only  for  a  short  time.  My  face  smarted  for  a  couple  of  hours, 
but  it  was  partly  because  I  got  it  badly  sunburned  while  I  was 
bathing,  and  stayed  in  so  long  that  it  became  plastered  over 
with  salt. 

No,  the  water  did  not  blister  us;  it  did  not  cover  us  with  a 
slimy  ooze  and  confer  upon  us  an  atrocious  fragrance ;  it  was 
not  very  slimy;  and  I  could  not  discover  that  we  smelt  really 
any  worse  than  we  have  always  smelt  since  we  have  been  in 
Palestine.  It  was  only  a  different  kind  of  smell,  but  not  con 
spicuous  on  that  account,  because  we  have  a  great  deal  of 
variety  in  that  respect.  We  didn't  smell,  there  on  the  Jordan, 
the  same  as  we  do  in  Jerusalem;  and  we  don't  smell  in  Jeru 
salem  just  as  we  did  in  Nazareth,  or  Tiberias,  or  Cesarea 
Philippi,  or  any  of  those  other  ruinous  ancient  towns  in  Galilee. 
No,  we  change  all  the  time,  and  generally  for  the  worse.  We 
do  our  own  washing. 

It  was  a  funny  bath.  We  could  not  sink.  One  could  stretch 
himself  at  full  length  on  his  back,  with  his  arms  on  his  breast, 
and  all  of  his  body  above  a  line  drawn  from  the  corner  of  his 
jaw  past  the  middle  of  his  side,  the  middle  of  his  leg  and 
through  his  ankle-bone,  would  remain  out  of  water.  He  could 
lift  his  head  clear  out  if  he  chose.  No  position  can  be  retained 
long;  you  lose  your  balance  and  whirl  over,  first  on  your  back 
and  then  on  your  face,  and  so  on.  You  can  lie  comfortably, 
on  your  back,  with  your  head  out,  and  your  legs  out  from 
your  knees  down,  by  steadying  yourself  with  your  hands.  You 
can  sit,  with  your  knees  drawn  up  to  your  chin  and  your  arms 
clasped  around  them,  but  you  are  bound  to  turn  over  presently, 
because  you  are  top-heavy  in  that  position.  You  can  stand 
up  straight  in  water  that  is  over  your  head,  and  from  the  mid 
dle  of  your  breast  upward  you  will  not  be  wet.  But  you  can 
not  remain  so.  The  water  will  soon  float  your  feet  to  the  sur 
face.  You  cannot  swim  on  your  back  and  make  and  progress 
of  any  consequence,  because  your  feet  stick  away  above  the 
surface,  and  there  is  nothing  to  propel  yourself  with  but  your 
heels.  If  you  swim  on  your  face,  you  kick  up  the  water  like 
a  stern-wheel  boat.  You  make  no  headway.  A  horse  is  so 
top-heavy  that  he  can  neither  swim  nor  stand  up  in  the  Dead 


430  MARK  TWAIN 

Sea.  He  turns  over  on  his  side  at  once.  Some  of  us  bathed 
for  more  than  an  hour,  and  then  came  out  coated  with  salt 
till  we  shone  like  riches.  We  scrubbed  it  off  with  a  coarse 
towel  and  rode  off  with  a  splendid  brand-new  smell,  though 
it  was  one  which  was  not  any  more  disagreeable  than  those  we 
have  been  for  several  weeks  enjoying.  It  was  the  variegated 
villainy  and  novelty  of  it  that  charmed  us.  Salt  crystals  glitter 
in  the  sun  about  the  shores  of  the  lake.  In  places  they  coal 
the  ground  like  a  brilliant  crust  of  ice. 

When  I  was  a  boy  I  somehow  got  the  impression  that  the 
river  Jordan  was  four  thousand  miles  long  and  thirty-five 
miles  wide.  It  is  only  ninety  miles  long,  and  so  crooked  that 
a  man  does  not  know  which  side  of  it  he  is  on  half  the  time. 
In  going  ninety  miles  it  does  not  get  over  more  than  fifty 
miles  of  ground.  It  is  not  any  wider  than  Broadway  in  New 
York.  There  is  the  Sea  of  Galilee  and  this  Dead  Sea — neither 
of  them  twenty  miles  long  or  thirteen  wide.  And  yet  when  I 
was  in  Sunday-school  I  thought  they  were  sixty  thousand  miles 
in  diameter. 

Travel  and  experience  mar  the  grandest  pictures  and  rob 
us  of  the  most  cherished  traditions  of  our  boyhood.  Well,  let 
them  go.  I  have  already  seen  the  Empire  of  King  Solomon 
diminished  to  the  size  of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania;  I  suppose 
I  can  bear  the  reduction  of  the  feeas  and  the  river. 

We  looked  everywhere,  as  we  passed  along,  but  never  saw 
grain  or  crystal  of  Lot's  wife.  It  was  a  great  disappointment. 
For  many  and  many  a  year  we  had  known  her  sad  story,  and 
taken  that  interest  in  her  which  misfortune  always  inspires. 
But  she  was  gone.  Her  picturesque  form  no  longer  looms 
above  the  desert  of  the  Dead  Sea  to  remind  the  tourist  of  the 
doom  that  fell  upon  the  lost  cities. 

I  cannot  describe  the  hideous  afternoon's  ride  from  the  Dead ' 
Sea  to  Mars  Saba.  It  oppresses  me  yet,  to  think  of  it.  The 
sun  so  pelted  us  that  the  tears  ran  down  our  cheeks  once  or 
twice.  The  ghastly,  treeless,  grassless,  breathless  canons 
smothered  us  as  if  we  had  been  in  an  oven.  The  suri  had 
positive  weight  to  it,  I  think.  Not  a  man  could  sit  erect  under 
it.  All  drooped  low  in  the  saddles.  John  preached  in  this 
"Wilderness"!  It  must  have  been  exhausting  work.  What 
a  very  heaven  the  massy  towers  and  ramparts  of  vast  Mars 
Saba  looked  to  us  when  We  caught  a  first  glimpse  of  them ! 

We  stayed  at  this  great  convent  all  night,  guests  of  the 
hospitable  priests.  Mars  Saba,  perched  upon  a  crag,  a  human 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  431 

nest  stuck  high  up  against  a  perpendicular  mountain  wall,  is 
a  world  of  grand  masonry  that  rises,  terrace  upon  terrace, 
away  above  your  head,  like  the  terraced  and  retreating  colon 
nades  one  sees  in  fanciful  pictures  of  Belshazzar's  Feast  and 
the  palaces  of  the  ancient  Pharaohs.  No  other  human  dwelling 
is  near.  It  was  founded  many  ages  ago  by  a  holy  recluse  who 
lived  at  first  in  a  cave  in  the  rock — a  cave  which  is  inclosed  in 
the  convent  walls  now,  and  was  reverently  shown  to  us  by 
the  priests.  This  recluse,  by  his  rigorous  torturing  of  his  flesh, 
his  diet  of  bread  and  water,  his  utter  withdrawal  from  all 
society  and  from  the  vanities  of  the  world,  and  his  constant 
prayer  and  saintly  contemplation  of  a  skull,  inspired  an  emu 
lation  that  brought  about  him  many  disciples.  The  precipice 
on  the  opposite  side  of  the  canon  is  well  perforated  with  the 
small  holes  they  dug  in  the  rock  to  live  in.  The  present  occu- 
,pants  of  Mars  Saba,  about  seventy  in  number,  are  all  hermits. 
They  wear  a  coarse  robe,  an  ugly,  brimless  stove-pipe  of  a  hat, 
and  go  without  shoes.  They  eat  nothing  whatever  but  bread 
and  salt;  they  drink  nothing  but  water.  As  long  as  they  live 
they  can  never  go  outside  the  walls,  or  look  upon  a  woman — 
for  no  woman  is  permitted  to  enter  Mars  Saba,  upon  any  pre 
text  whatsoever. 

Some  of  those  men  have  been  shut  up  there  for  thirty  years. 
In  all  that  dreary  time  they  have  not  heard  the  laughter  of  a 
child  or  the  blessed  voice  of  a  woman;  they  have  seen  no 
human  tears,  no  human  smiles;  they  have  known  no  human 
joys,  no  wholesome  human  sorrows.  In  their  hearts  are  no 
memories  of  the  past,  in  their  brains  no  dreams  of  the  future. 
All  that  is  lovable,  beautiful,  worthy,  they  have  put  far  away 
from  them;  against  all  things  that  are  pleasant  to  look  upon, 
and  all  sounds  that  are  music  to  the  ear,  they  have  barred  their 
massive  doors  and  reared  their  relentless  walls  of  stone  for 
ever.  They  have  banished  the  tender  grace  of  life  and  left 
only  the  sapped  and  skinny  mockery.  Their  lips  are  lips  that 
never  kiss  and  never  sing;  their  hearts  are  hearts  that  never 
hate  and  never  love ;  their  breasts  are  breasts  that  never  swell 
with  the  sentiment,  "I  have  a  country  and  a  flag."  They  are 
dead  men  who  walk. 

I  set  down  these  first  thoughts  because  they  are  natural — 
not  because  they  are  just  or  because  it  is  right  to  set  them 
down.  It  is  easy  for  bookmakers  to  say  "I  thought  so  and  so 
as  I  looked  upon  such  and  such  a  scene" — when  the  truth  is, 
they  thought  all  those  fine  things  afterward.  One's  first 


432  MARK  TWAIN 

thought  is  not  likely  to  be  strictly  accurate,  yet  it  is  no  crime 
to  think  it  and  none  to  write  it  down,  subject  to  modification 
by  later  experience.  These  hermits  arc  dead  men,  in  several 
respects,  but  not  in  all;  and  it  is  not  proper  that,  thinking  ill 
of  them  at  first,  I  should  go  on  doing  so,  or,  speaking  ill  of 
them,  I  should  reiterate  the  words  and  stick  to  them.  No, 
they  treated  us  too  kindly  for  that.  There  is  something  human 
about  them  somewhere.  They  knew  we  were  foreigners  and 
Protestants,  and  not  likely  to  feel  admiration  or  much  friend 
liness  toward  them.  But  their  large  charity  was  above  con 
sidering  such  things.  They  simply  saw  in  us  men  who  were 
hungry,  and  thirsty,  and  tired,  and  that  was  sufficient.  They 
opened  their  doors  and  gave  us  welcome.  They  asked  no 
questions,  and  they  made  no  self-righteous  display  of  their 
hospitality.  They  fished  for  no  compliments.  They  moved 
quietly  about,  setting  the  table  for  us,  making  the  beds,  and 
bringing  water  to  wash  in,  and  paid  no  heed  when  we  said  it 
was  wrong  for  them  to  do  that  when  we  had  men  whose  busi 
ness  it  was  to  perform  such  offices.  We  fared  most  comfort 
ably,  and  sat  late  at  dinner.  We  walked  all  over  the  building 
with  the  hermits  afterward,  and  then  sat  on  the  lofty  battle 
ments  and  smoked  while  we  enjoyed  the  cool  air,  the  wild 
scenery,  and  the  sunset.  One  or  two  chose  cozy  bedrooms  to 
sleep  in,  but  the  nomadic  instinct  prompted  the  rest  to  sleep 
on  the  broad  divan  that  extended  around  the  great  hall,  be 
cause  it  seemed  like  sleeping  out-of-doors,  and  so  was  more 
cheery  and  inviting.  It  was  a  royal  rest  we  had. 

When  we  got  up  to  breakfast  in  the  morning,  we  were  new 
men.  For  all  this  hospitality  no  strict  charge  was  made.  WTe 
could  give  something  if  we  chose;  we  need  give  nothing,  if 
we  were  poor  or  if  we  were  stingy.  The  pauper  and  the  miser  I 
are  as  free  as  any  in  the  Catholic  convents  of  Palestine.  I 
have  been  educated  to  enmity  toward  everything  that  is  Catholic 
and  sometimes,  in  consequence  of  this,  I  find  it  much  easier 
to  discover  Catholic  faults  than  Catholic  merits.  But  there 
is  one  thing  I  feel  no  disposition  to  overlook,  and  no  disposi 
tion  to  forget;  and  that  is,  the  honest  gratitude  I  and  all 
pilgrims  owe  to  the  Convent  Fathers  in  Palestine.  Their 
doors  are  always  open,  and  there  is  always  a  welcome  for  any 
worthy  man  who  comes,  whether  he  comes  in  rags  or  clad  in 
purple.  The  Catholic  convents  are  a  priceless  blessing  to 
the  poor.  A  pilgrim  without  money,  whether  he  be  a 
Protestant  or  a  Catholic,  can  travel  the  length  and  breadth 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  433 

of  Palestine,  and  in  the  midst  of  her  desert  wastes  find 
wholesome  food  and  a  clean  bed  every  night,  in  these  build 
ings.  Pilgrims  in  better  circumstances  are  often  stricken 
down  by  the  sun  and  the  fevers  of  the  country,  and  then  their 
saving  refuge  is  the  convent.  Without  these  hospitable  re 
treats,  travel  in  Palestine  would  be  a  pleasure  which  none  but 
the  stronegst  men  could  dare  to  undertake.  Our  party,  pil 
grims  and  all,  will  always  be  ready  and  always  willing  to  touch 
glasses  and  drink  health,  prosperity,  and  long  life  to  the  Con 
vent  Fathers  of  Palestine. 

So,  rested  and  refreshed,  we  fell  into  line  and  filed  away 
over  the  barren  mountains  of  Judea,  and  along  rocky  ridges 
and  through  sterile  gorges,  where  eternal  silence  and  solitude 
reigned.  Even  the  scattering  groups  of  armed  shepherds 
we  met  the  afternoon  before,  tending  their  flocks  of  long 
haired  goats,  were  wanting  here.  We  saw  but  two  living 
creatures.  They  were  gazelles  of  "soft-eyed"  notoriety.  They 
looked  like  very  young  kids,  but  they  annihilated  distance  like 
an  express-train.  I  have  not  seen  animals  that  moved  faster, 
unless,  I  might  say  it  of  the  antelopes  of  our  own  great  plains. 

At  nine  or  ten  in  the  morning  we  reached  the  Plain  of  the 
Shepherds,  and  stood  in  a  walled  garden  of  olives  where  the 
shepherds  were  watching  their  flocks  by  night,  eighteen  cen 
turies  ago,  when  the  multitudes  of  angels  brought  them  the 
tidings  that  the  Saviour  was  born.  A  quarter  of  a  mile  away 
was  Bethlehem  of  Judea,  and  the  pilgrims  took  some  of  the 
stone  wall  and  hurried  on. 

The  Plain  of  the  Shepherds  is  a  desert,  paved  with  loose 
stones,  void  of  vegetation,  glaring  in  the  fierce  sun.  Only  the 
music  of  the  angels  it  knew  once  could  charm  its  shrubs  and 
flowers  to  life  again  and  restore  its  vanished  beauty.  No  less 
potent  enchantment  could  avail  to  work  this  miracle. 

In  the  huge  Church  of  the  Nativity,  in  Bethlehem,  built 
fifteen  hundred  years  ago  by  the  inveterate  St.  Helena,  they 
took  us  below-ground,  and  into  a  grotto  cut  in  the  living  rock. 
This  was  the  "manger"  where  Christ  was  born.  A  silver  star 
set  in  the  floor  bears  a  Latin  inscription  to  that  effect.  It  is 
polished  with  the  kisses  of  many  generations  of  worshiping 
pilgrims.  The  grotto  was  tricked  out  in  the  usual  tasteless 
style  observable  in  all  the  holy  places  of  Palestine.  As  in  the 
Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher,  envy  and  uncharitableness 
were  apparent  here.  The  priests  and  the  members  of  the 
Greek  and  Latin  churches  cannot  come  by  the  same  corridor  to 


434  MARK  TWAIN 

kneel  in  the  sacred  birthplace  of  the  Redeemer,  but  are  com 
pelled  to  approach  and  retire  by  different  avenues,  lest  they 
quarrel  and  fight  on  this  holiest  ground  on  earth. 

I  have  no  "meditations,"  suggested  by  this  spot  where  the 
very  first  "Merry  Christmas!"  was  uttered  in  all  the  world, 
and  from  whence  the  friend  of  my  childhood,  Santa  Glaus, 
departed  on  his  first  journey  to  gladden  and  continue  to  gladden 
roaring  firesides  on  wintry  mornings  in  many  a  distant  land 
forever  and  forever.  I  touch,  with  reverent  ringer,  the  actual 
spot  where  the  infant  Jesus  lay,  but  I  think — nothing. 

Sou  cannot  think  in  this  place,  any  more  than  you  can  in  any 
{other  in  Palestine  that  would  be  likely  to  inspire  reflection. 
(Beggars,  cripples,  and  monks  compass  you  about,  and  make 
[you  think  only  of  bucksheesh  when  you  would  rather  think  of 
(something  more  in  keeping  with  the  character  of  the  spot^ 

I  was  glad  to  get  away,  and  glad  when  we  had  walked 
through  the  grottoes  where  Eusebius  wrote,  and  Jerome  fasted, 
and  Joseph  prepared  for  the  flight  into  Egypt,  and  the  dozen 
other  distinguished  grottoes,  and  knew  we  were  done.  The 
Church  of  the  Nativity  is  almost  as  well  packed  with  exceeding 
holy  places  as  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Sepulcher  itself.  They 
even  have  in  it  a  grotto  wherein  twenty  thousand  children  were 
slaughtered  by  Herod  when  he  was  seeking  the  life  of  the 
infant  Saviour. 

We  went  to  the  Milk  Grotto,  of  course — a  cavern  where 
Mary  hid  herself  for  a  while  before  the  flight  into  Egypt. 
Its  walls  were  black  before  she  entered,  but  in  suckling  the 
Child,  a  drop  of  her  milk  fell  upon  the  floor  and  instantly 
changed  the  darkness  of  the  walls  to  its  own  snowy  hue.  We 
took  many  little  fragments  of  stone  from  here,  because  it  is 
well  known  in  all  the  East  that  a  barren  woman  hath  need  only 
to  touch  her  lips  to  one  of  these  and  her  failing  will  depart 
from  her.  We  took  many  specimens,  to  the  end  that  we  might 
confer  happiness  upon  certain  households  that  we  wot  of. 

We  got  away  from  Bethlehem  and  its  troops  of  beggars  and 
relic-peddlers  in  the  afternoon,  and  after  spending  some  little 
time  at  Rachel's  tomb,  hurried  to  Jerusalem  as  fast  as  possible. 
I  never  was  so  glad  to  get  home  again  before.  I  never  have 
enjoyed  rest  as  I  have  enjoyed  it  during  these  last  few  hours. 
The  journey  to  the  Dead  Sea,  the  Jordan,  and  Bethlehem  was 
short,  but  it  was  an  exhausting  one.  Such  roasting  heat,  such 
oppressive  solitude,  and  such  dismal  desolation  cannot  surely 
exist  elsewhere  on  earth.  And  such  fatigue ! 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  435 

commonest  sagacity  warns  me  thai  I  ought  to  tell  the 
customary  pleasant  lie,  and  say  I  tore  myself  reluctantly  away 
from  every  noted  place  in  Palestine.  Everybody  tells  that, 
but  with  as  little  ostentation  as  I  may,  I  doubt  the  word  of 
every  he  who  tells  it.  I  could  take  a  dreadful  oath  that  I  have 
never  heard  any  one  of  our  forty  pilgrims  say  anything  of  the 
sort,  and  they  are  as  worthy  and  as  sincerely  devout  as  any 
that  come  here.  They  will  say  it  when  they  get  home,  fast 
enough,  but  why  should  they  not?  They  do  not  wish  to  array 
themselves  against  all  the  Lamartines  and  Grimeses  in  the 
world.  It  does  not  stand  to  reason  that  men  are  reluctant  to 
leave  places  where  the  very  life  is  almost  badgered  out  of  them 
by  importunate  swarms  of  beggars  and  peddlers  who  hang  in 
strings  to  one's  sleeves  and  coat-tails  and  shriek  and  shout  in 
his  ears  and  horrify  his  vision  with  the  ghastly  sores  and  mal 
formations  they  exhibit.  One  is  glad  to  get  awayT)  I  have 
heard  shameless  people  say  they  were  glad  to  get  away  from 
Ladies'  Festivals  where  they  were  importuned  to  buy  by  bevies 
of  lovely  young  ladies.  Transform  those '  houris  into  dusky 
hags  and  ragged  savages,  and  replace  their  rounded  forms  with 
shrunken  and  knotted  distortions,  their  soft  hands  with  scarred 
and  hideous  deformities,  and  the  persuasive  music  of  their 
voices  with  the  discordant  din  of  a  hated  language,  and  then 
see  how  much  lingering  reluctance  to  leave  could  be  mustered. 
No,  it  is  the  neat  thing  to  say  you  were  reluctant,  and  then 
append  the  profound  thoughts  that  "struggled  for  utterance"  in 
your  brain ;  but  it  is  the  true  thing  to  say  you  were  not  reluc 
tant,  and  found  it  impossible  to  think  at  all — though  in  good 
sooth  it  is  not  respectable  to  say  it,  and  not  poetical,  either. 

(We  do  not  think,  in  the  holy  places ;  we  think  in  bed,  after 
ward,  when  the  glare,  and  the  noise,  and  the  confusion  are 
gone,  and  in  fancy  we  revisit  alone  the  solemn  monuments  of 
the  past,  and  summon  the  phantom  pageants  of  an  age  that  has 
passed  awayp 


CHAPTER  LVI 

visited  all  the  holy  places  about  Jerusalem  which 
we  had  left  unvisited  when  we  journeyed  to  the 
Jordan,  and  then,  about  three  o'clock  one  afternoon, 
we  fell  into  procession  and  marched  out  at  the  stately  Damas 
cus  gate,  and  the  walls  of  Jerusalem  shut  us  out  forever.  We 
paused  on  the  summit  of  a  distant  hill  and  took  a  final  look 
and  made  a  final  farewell  to  the  venerable  city  which  had  been 
such  a  good  home  to  us. 

For  about  four  hours  we  traveled  down-hill  constantly.  We 
followed  a  narrow  bridle-path  which  traversed  the  beds  of  the 
mountain  gorges,  and  when  we  could  we  got  out  of  the  way  of 
the  long  trains  of  laden  camels  and  asses,  and  when  we  could 
not  we  suffered  the  misery  of  being  mashed  up  against  per 
pendicular  walls  of  rock  and  having  our  legs  bruised  by  the 
passing  freight.  Jack  was  caught  two  or  three  times,  and  Dan 
and  Moult  as  often.  One  horse  had  a  heavy  fall  on  the  slippery- 
rocks,  and  the  others  had  narrow  escapes.  However,  this  was 
as  good  a  road  as  we  had  found  in  Palestine,  and  possibly  even 
the  best,  and  so  there  was  not  much  grumbling. 

Sometimes,  in  the  glens,  we  came  upon  luxuriant  orchards 
of  figs,  apricots,  pomegranates,  and  such  things,  but  oftener 
the  scenery  was  rugged,  mountainous,  verdureless,  and  forbid 
ding.  Here  and  there,  towers  were  perched  high  up  on  accliv 
ities  which  seemed  almost  inaccessible.  This  fashion  is  as  old 
as  Palestine  itself,  and  was  adopted  in  ancient  times  for  secu 
rity  against  enemies. 

We  crossed  the  brook  which  furnished  David  the  stone  that 
killed  Goliah,  and,  no  doubt,  we  looked  upon  the  very  ground 
whereon  that  noted  battle  was  fought.  We  passed  by  a  pictur 
esque  old  gothic  ruin  whose  stone  pavements  had  rung  to  the 
armed  heels  of  many  a  valorous  Crusader,  and  we  rode  through 
a  piece  of  country  which  we  were  told  once  knew  Samson  as 
a  citizen. 

We  stayed  all  night  with  the  good  monks  at  the  convent  of 
Ramleh,  and  in  the  morning  got  up  and  galloped  the  horses 
a  good  part  of  the  distance  from  there  to  Jaffa,  or  Joppo,  for 

436 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  437 

the  plain  was  as  level  as  a  floor  and  free  from  stones,  and  besides 
this  was  our  last  march  in  Holy  Land.  These  two  or  three 
hours  finished,  we  and  the  tired  horses  could  have  rest  and 
sleep  as  long  as  we  wanted  it.  This  was  the  plain  of  which 
Joshua  spoke  when  he  said,  "Sun,  stand  thou  still  on  Gibeon, 
and  thou  moon  in  the  valley  of  Ajalon."  As  we  drew  near  to 
Jaffa,  the  boys  spurred  up  the  horses  and  indulged  in  the  ex 
citement  of  an  actual  race — an  experience  we  had  hardly  had 
since  we  raced  on  donkeys  in  the  Azores  islands. 

We  came  finally  to  the  noble  grove  of  orange  trees  in  which 
the  Oriental  city  of  Jaffa  lies  buried ;  we  passed  through  the 
walls,  and  rode  again  down  narrow  streets  and  among  swarms 
of  animated  rags,  and  saw  other  sights  and  had  other  experi 
ences  we  had  long  been  familiar  with.  We  dismounted,  for 
the  last  time,  and  out  in  the  offing,  riding  at  anchor,  we  saw 
the  ship !  I  put  an  exclamation-point  there  because  we  felt 
one  when  we  saw  the  vessel.  The  long  pilgrimage  was  ended, 
and  somehow  we  seemed  to  feel  glad  of  it. 

[For  description  of  Jaffa,  see  Universal  Gazetteer.]  Simon 
the  Tanner  formerly  lived  here.  We  went  to  his  house.  All 
the  pilgrims  visit  Simon  the  Tanner's  house.  Peter  saw  the 
vision  of  the  beasts  let  down  in  a  sheet  when  he  lay  upon  the 
roof  of  Simon  the  Tanner's  house.  It  was  from  Jaffa  that 
Jonah  sailed  when  he  was  told  to  go  and  prophesy  against 
Nineveh,  and,  no  doubt,  it  was  not  far  from  the  town  that  the 
whale  threw  him  up  when  he  discovered  that  he  had  no  ticket. 
Jonah  was  disobedient,  and  of  a  faultfinding,  complaining  dis 
position,  and  deserves  to  be  lightly  spoken  of,  almost.  The 
timbers  used  in  the  construction  of  Solomon's  temple  were 
floated  to  Jaffa  in  rafts,  and  the  narrow  opening  in  the  reef 
through  which  they  passed  to  the  shore  is  not  an  inch  wider 
or  a  shade  less  dangerous  to  navigate  than  it  was  then.  Such 
is  the  sleepy  nature  of  the  population  Palestine's  only  good  sea 
port  has  now  and  always  had,  Jaffa  has  a  history  and  a  stir 
ring  one.  It  will  be  discovered  anywhere  in  this  book.  If  the 
reader  will  call  at  the  circulating  library  and  mention  my  name, 
he  will  be  furnished  with  books  which  will  afford  him  the  fullest 
information  concerning  Jaffa^ 

So  ends  the  pilgrimage.  QVe  ought  to  be  glad  that  we  did 
not  make  it  for  the  purpose  of  feasting  our  eyes  upon  fascinat 
ing  aspects  of  nature,  for  we  should  have  been  disappointed — 
at  least  at  this  season  of  the  year.  A  writer  in  Life  in  the 
Holy  Land  observes: 


:   -  -  .  T"  .,:  ; 

:.".!;     ;.. .;     ":.:::::-.;     :.      rv.  :  :  ~:\.'.     '~  "_.:  •  :  .  '      ...' 

-      -         -  *~  "  "'.._"  .  _  7 

.amper   ^r^^nv,    am:  ^ZHTEL   snniax   i£   •nor    iwn_   tuumir^.    TPC   3ms: 

-    ::.  -      •       :  -  -'  -         ""-      " 

"       ~  _  ~      .:/:.;:     -        .        "     r  ..       '-.          '      '.     "    "      _    .     " 


^iwi  re 
r^r  ia&- 

-     " 
.      Tk^ 

i  -•: 


t!  : 


I?    IE 


IKXOCENTS  ABROAD  - '.  > 


honor  of  the  Saviour's  presence;  the  halkwai 

abepfaerds  watched  their  flocks  ts^r  night,  and  1 
•ang-  Peace  oti  earth,  good  wiH  to  nnea,  is  on 
sring  creature,  and  tmUessed  by  any  fcatme 

to  the  eye.    Re=Gwned  Jernaslem  itself,  dse  s 

^Lt^er  Tillage;  tfce  rkfaes  ^yf  Sefosnwi  are  «KJ 
cctnpe!  the  adsnEraaon  of  yigrCiTTg  OrKafltal 
f  al  tatrrvle  wfikh  was  die  pridfe  and  tf«e 
irA  the  OtKtran  crescent  is  Kftted  alxwe  tin 
"isat  tsso*t  rneoOTalile  day  fn  tfie  anoals  of 
-eared  the  Holj  Cross,     Tfac  noted  Sea  o 
eets  ctace  rode  at  ancfecr  and  the 
ailed  in  their  ships,  was  knj  ago  des 
ar  and  conxnerce,  and  its  borders  a 


beggared  Arabs  ;  Bethsaiffa  asid  Qsoffazin  fea 
±e  eardi,  and  die  "desert  pfaces9 
tiwosands  cf  men  once  Hstened  to  tine 

•    ,    _.    .     .  -.'-:--;      -;  -•-:-.      '--;'-.  :    -. 


CHAPTER   LVII 

IT  was  worth  a  kingdom  to  be  at  sea  again.  It  was  a  relief 
to  drop  all  anxiety  whatsoever— all  questions  as  to  where 
we  should  go ;  how  long  we  should  stay ;  whether  it  were 
worth  while  to  go  or  not;  all  anxieties  about  the  condition  of 
the  horses;  all  such  questions  as  "Shall  we  ever  get  to  water?'' 
"Shall  we  ever  lunch?"  "Ferguson,  how  many  more  million 
miles  have  \ve  got  to  creep  under  this  awful  sun  before  we 
camp?"  It  was  a  relief  to  cast  all  these  torturing  little  anxie 
ties  far  away — ropes  of  steel  they  were,  and  every  one  with 
a  separate  and  distinct  strain  on  it — and  feel,  the  temporary 
contentment  that  is  born  of  the  banishment  of  all  care  and 
responsibility.  We  did  not  look  at  the  compass;  we  did  not 
care,  now,  where  the  ship  went  to,  so  that  she  went  out  of 
sight  of  land  as  quickly  as  possible.  When  I  travel  again, 
I  wish  to  go  in  a  pleasure  ship.  No  amount  of  money 
could  have  purchased  for  us,  in  a  strange  vessel  and  among 
unfamiliar  faces,  the  perfect  satisfaction  and  the  sense  of  being 
at  home  again  which  we  experienced  when  we  stepped  on 
board  the  Quaker  City, — our  own  ship — after  this  wearisome 
pilgrimage.  It  is  a  something  we  have  felt  always  when  we 
returned  to  her,  and  a  something  we  had  no  desire  to  sell. 

We  took  off  our  blue  woolen  shirts,  our  spurs  and  heavy 
boots,  our  sanguinary  revolvers  and  our  buckskin-seated  panta 
loons,  and  got  shaved,  and  came  out  in  Christian  costume  once 
more.  All  but  Jack,  who  changed  all  other  articles  of  his  dress,- 
but  clung  to  his  traveling-pantaloons.  They  still  preserved 
their  ample  buckskin  seat  intact;  and  so  his  short  pea-jacket 
and  his  long,  thin  legs  assisted  to  make  him  a  picturesque  ob 
ject  whenever  he  stood  on  the  forecastle  looking  abroad  upon 
the  ocean  over  the  bows.  At  such  times  his  father's  last  in 
junction  suggested  itself  to  me.  He  said : 

"Jack,  my  boy,  you  are  about  to  go  among  a  brilliant  com 
pany  of  gentlemen  and  ladies,  who  are  refined  and  cultivated, 
and  thoroughly  accomplished  in  the  manners  and  customs  of 
good  society.  Listen  to  their  conversation,  study  their  habits 
of  life,  and  learn.  Be  polite  and  obliging  to  all,  and  considerate 

440 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  441 

toward  every  one's  opinions,  failings,  and  prejudices.  Com 
mand  the  just  respect  of  all  your  fellow-voyagers,  even  though 
you  fail  to  win  their  friendly  regard.  And  Jack — don't  you 
ever  dare,  while  you  live,  appear  in  public  on  those  decks  in 
fair  weather,  in  a  costume  unbecoming  your  mother's  drawing- 
room  !" 

It  would  have  been  worth  any  price  if  the  father  of  this 
hopeful  youth  could  have  stepped  on  board  some  time,  and 
seen  him  standing  high  on  the  forecastle,  pea-jacket,  tassled 
red  fez,  buckskin  patch  and  all, — placidly  contemplating  the 
ocean — a  rare  spectacle  for  anybody's  drawing-room. 

After  a  pleasant  voyage  and  a  good  rest,  we  drew  near  to 
Egypt,  and  out  of  the  mellowest  of  sunsets  we  saw  the  domes 
and  minarets  of  Alexandria  rise  into  view.  As  soon  as  the 
anchor  was  down,  Jack  and  I  got  a  boat  and  went  ashore.  It 
was  night  by  this  time,  and  the  other  passengers  were  content 
tb  remain  at  home  and  visit  ancient  Egypt  after  breakfast. 
It  was  the  way  they  did  at  Constantinople.  They  took  a  lively 
interest  in  new  countries,  but  their  school-boy  impatience  had 
worn  off,  and  they  had  learned  that  it  was  wisdom  to  take 
things  easy  and  go  along  comfortably — these  old  countries  do 
not  go  away  in  the  night;  they  stay  till  after  breakfast. 

When  we  reached  the  pier  we  found  an  army  of  Egyptian 
boys  with  donkeys  no  larger  than  themselves,  waiting  for 
passengers — for  donkeys  are  the  omnibuses  of  Egypt.  We 
preferred  to  walk,  but  we  could  not  have  our  own  way.  The 
boys  crowded  about  us,  clamored  around  us,  and  slewed  their 
donkeys  exactly  across  our  path,  no  matter  which  way  we 
turned.  They  were  good-natured  rascals,  and  so  were  the 
donkeys.  We  mounted,  and  the  boys  ran  behind  us  and  kept 
the  donkeys  in  a  furious  gallop,  as  is  the  fashion  at  Damascus. 
I  believe  I  would  rather  ride  a  donkey  than  any  beast  in  the 
world.  He  goes  briskly,  he  puts  on  no  airs,  he  is  docile, 
though  opinionated.  Satan  himself  could  not  scare  him,  and 
he  is  convenient — very  convenient.  W^hen  you  are  tired  riding 
you  can  rest  your  feet  on  the  ground  and  let  him  gallop  from 
under  you. 

We  found  the  hotel  and  secured  rooms,  and  were  happy 
to  know  that  the  Prince  of  Wales  had  stopped  there  once. 
They  had  it  everywhere  on  signs.  No  other  princes  had 
stopped  there  since,  till  Jack  and  I  came.  We  went  abroad 
through  the  town,  then,  and  found  it  a  city  of  huge  commercial 
buildings,  of  broad,  handsome  streets  brilliant  with  gaslight. 


442  MARK  TWAIN 

By  night  it  was  a  sort  of  reminiscence  of  Paris.  But  finally 
Jack  found  an  ice-cream  saloon,  and  that  closed  investigations 
for  that  evening.  The  weather  was  very  hot,  it  had  been 
many  a  day  since  Jack  had  seen  ice-cream,  and  so  it  was  useless 
to  talk  of  leaving  the  saloon  till  it  shut  up. 

In  the  morning  the  lost  tribes  of  America  came  ashore  and 
infested  the  hotels  and  took  possession  of  all  the  donkeys  and 
other  open  barouches  that  offered.  They  went  in  picturesque 
procession  to  the  American  Consul's ;  to  the  great  gardens ;  to 
Cleopatra's  Needles;  to  Pompey's  Pillar;  to  the  palace  of  the 
Viceroy  of  Egypt;  to  the  Nile;  to  the  superb  groves  of  date- 
palms.  One  of  our  most  inveterate  relic-hunters  had  his 
hammer  with  him,  and  tried  to  break  a  fragment  off  the  up 
right  Needle  and  could  not  do  it;  he  tried  the  prostrate  one 
and  failed ;  he  borrowed  a  heavy  sledge-hammer  from  a  mason 
and  failed  again.  He  tried  Pompey's  Pillar,  and  this  baffled 
him.  Scattered  all  about  the  mighty  monolith  were  sphinxes 
of  noble  countenance,  carved  out  of  Egyptian  granite  as  hard 
as  blue  steel,  and  whose  shapely  features  the  wear  of  five 
thousand  years  had  failed  to  mark  or  mar.  The  relic-hunter 
battered  at  these  persistently,  and  sweated  profusely  over  his 
work.  He  might  as  well  have  attempted  to  deface  the  moon. 
They  regarded  him  serenely  with  the  stately  smile  they  had 
worn  so  long,  and  which  seemed  to  say,  "Peck  away,  poor 
insect;  we  were  not  made  to  fear  such  as  you;  in  tenscore 
dragging  ages  we  have  seen  more  of  your  kind  than  there  are 
sands  at  your  feet ;  have  they  left  a  blemish  upon  us  ?" 

But  I  am  forgetting  the  Jaffa  Colonists.  At  Jaffa  we  had 
taken  on  board  some  forty  members  of  a  very  celebrated  com 
munity.  They  were  male  and  female;  babies,  young  boys  and 
young  girls ;  young  married  people,  and  some  who  had  passed 
a  shade  beyond  the  prime  of  life.  I  refer  to  the  "Adams  Jaffa 
Colony."  Others  had  deserted  before.  We  left  in  Jaffa  Mr. 
Adams,  his  wife,  and  fifteen  unfortunates  who  had  not  only 
had  no  money  but  did  not  know  where  to  turn  or  whither  to  go. 
Such  was  the  statement  made  to  us.  Our  forty  were  miserable 
enough  in  the  first  place,  and  they  lay  about  the  decks  seasick 
all  the  voyage,  which  about  completed  their  misery,  I  take  it. 
However,  one  or  two  young  men  remained  upright,  and  by 
constant  persecution  we  Wormed  out  of  them  some  little  in 
formation.  They  gave  it  reluctantly  and  in  a  very  fragmentary 
condition,  for,  having  been  shamefully  humbugged  by  their 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  443 

prophet,  they  felt  humiliated  and  unhappy.  In  such  circum 
stances  people  do  not  like  to  talk. 

The  colony  was  a  complete  fiasco.  I  have  already  said  that 
such  as  could  get  away  did  so,  from  time  to  time.  The  prophet 
Adams — once  an  actor,  then  several  other  things,  afterward  a 
Mormon  and  a  missionary,  always  an  adventurer — remains  at 
Jaffa  with  his  handful  of  sorrowful  subjects.  The  forty  we 
brought  away  with  us  were  chiefly  destitute,  though  not  all 
of  them.  They  wished  to  get  to  Egypt.  What  might  become 
of  them  then  they  did  not  know  and  probably  did  not  care — 
anything  to  get  away  from  hated  Jaffa.  They  had  little  to 
hope  for ;  because  after  many  appeals  to  the  sympathies  of  New 
England,  made  by  strangers  of  Boston,  through  the  news 
papers,  and  after  the  establishment  of  an  office  there  for  the 
reception  of  moneyed  contributions  for  the  Jaffa  colonists,  one 
dollar  was  subscribed.  The  consul-general  for  Egypt  showed 
me  the  newspaper  paragraph  which  mentioned  the  circum 
stance,  and  mentioned  also  the  discontinuance  of  the  effort  and 
the  closing  of  the  office.  It  was  evident  that  practical  New 
England  was  not  sorry  to  be  rid  of  such  visionaries  and  was  not 
in  the  least  inclined  to  hire  anybody  to  bring  them  back  to  her. 
Still,  to  get  to  Egypt  was  something,  in  the  eyes  of  the  unfor 
tunate  colonists,  hopeless  as  the  prospect  seemed  of  ever  getting 
further. 

Thus  circumstanced,  they  landed  at  Alexandria  from  our 
ship.  One  of  our  passengers,  Mr.  Moses  S.  Beach,  of  the 
New  York  Sun,  inquired  of  the  consul-general  what  it  would 
cost  to  send  these  people  to  their  home  in  Maine  by  the  way  of 
Liverpool,  and  he  said  fifteen  hundred  dollars  in  gold  would 
do  it.  Mr.  Beach  gave  his  check  for  the  money,  and  so  the 
troubles  of  the  Jaffa  colonists  were  at  an  end.1 

Alexandria  was  too  much  like  a  European  city  to  be  novel, 
and  we  soon  tired  of  it.  We  took  the  cars  and  came  up  here 
to  ancient  Cairo,  which  is  an  Oriental  city  and  of  the  com- 
pletest  pattern.  There  is  little  about  it  to  disabuse  one's  mind 
of  the  error  if  he  should  take  it  into  his  head  that  he  was  in  the 

alt  was  an  unselfish  act  of  benevolence;  it  was  done  without  any 
ostentation,  and  has  never  been  mentioned  in  any  newspaper,  I  think. 
Therefore  it  is  refreshing  to  learn  now,  several  months  after  the 
above  narrative  was  written,  that  another  man  received  all  the  credit 
of  this  rescue  of  the  colonists.  Such  is  life. 


444  MARK  TWAIN 

heart  of  Arabia.  Stately  camels  and  dromedaries,  swarthy 
Egyptians,  and  likewise  Turks  and  black  Ethiopians,  turbaned, 
sashed,  and  blazing  in  a  rich  variety  of  Oriental  costumes  of  all 
shades  of  flashy  colors,  are  what  one  sees  on  every  hand  crowd 
ing  the  narrow  streets  and  the  honeycombed  bazars.  We  are 
stopping  at  Shepherd's  Hotel,  which  is  the  worst  on  earth 
except  the  one  I  stopped  at  once  in  a  small  town  in  the  United 
States.  It  is  pleasant  to  read  this  sketch  in  my  note-book,  now, 
and  know  that  I  can  stand  Shepherd's  Hotel,  sure,  because  I 
have  been  in  one  just  like  it  in  America  and  survived : 

I  stopped  at  the  Benton  House.  It  used  to  be  a  good  hotel,  but  that 
proves  nothing — I  used  to  be  a  good  boy,  for  that  matter.  Both  of 
us  have  lost  character  of  late  years.  The  Benton  is  not  a  good  hotel. 

The  Benton  lacks  a  very  great  deal  of  being  a  good  hotel.  Per 
dition  is  full  of  better  hotels  than  the  Benton. 

It  was  late  at  night  when  I  got  there,  and  I  told  the  clerk  I  would 
like  plenty  of  lights,  because  I  wanted  to  read  an  hour  or  two.  When 
I  reached  No.  15  with  the  porter  (we  came  along  a  dim  hall  that 
was  clad  in  ancient  carpeting,  faded,  worn  out  in  many  places,  and 
patched  with  old  scraps  of  oilcloth — A  hall  that  sank  under  one's  feet, 
and  creaked  dismally  to  every  footstep) he  struck  a  light — two  inches 
of  sallow,  sorrowful,  consumptive  tallow  candle,  that  burned  blue,  and 
sputtered,  and  got  discouraged  and  went  out.  The  porter  lit  it 
again,  and  I  asked  if  that  was  all  the  light  the  clerk  sent.  He  said, 
"Oh,  no,  J've  got  another  one  here,"  and  he  produced  another  couple 
of  inches  of  tallow  candle.  I  said,  "Light  them  both — I'll  have  to 
have  one  to  see  the  other  by."  He  did  it,  but  the  result  was  drearier 
than  darkness  itself.  He  was  a  cheery,  accommodating  rascal.  He  said 
he  would  go  "somewjieres"  and  steal  a  lamp.  I  abetted  and  encouraged 
him  in  his  criminal  design.  I  heard  the  landlord  get  after  him  in 
the  hall  ten  minutes  afterward. 

"Where  are  you  going  with  that  lamp?" 

"Fifteen  wants  it,  sir." 

"Fifteen!  why  he's  got  a  double  lot  of  candles— does  the  man  want 
to  illuminate  the  house? — does  he  want  to  get  up  a  torchlight  pro 
cession? — what  is  he  up  to,  anyhow?" 

"He  don't  like  them  candles — says  he  wants  a  lamp." 

"Why,  what  in  the  nation  does — why  I  never  heard  of  such  a 
thing?  What  on  earth  can  he  want  with  that  lamp?" 

"Well,  he  only  wants  to  read— that's  what  he  says." 

"Wants  to  read,  does  he?— ain't  satisfied  with  a  thousand  candles, 
but  has  to  have  a  lamp  I— I  do  wonder  what  the  devil  that  fellow  wants 
that  lamp  for?  Take  him  another  candle,  and  then  if—" 

"But  he  wants  the  lamp— 'says  he'll  burn  the  d— d  old  house  down 
if  he  don't  get  a  lamp !"  [A  remark  which  I  never  made,] 

"I'd  like  to  see  him  at  it  once.     Well,   you  take  it  along— but   I 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  445 

swear  it  beats  my  time,  though — and  see  if  you  can't  find  out  what 
in  the  very  nation  he  wants  with  that  lamp." 

And  he  went  off  growling  to  himself  and  still  wondering  and  won 
dering  over  the  unaccountable  conduct  of  No.  15.  The  lamp  was  a 
good  one,  but  it  revealed  some  disagreeable  things — a  bed  in  the 
suburbs  of  a  desert  room — a  bed  that  had  hills  and  valleys  in  it,  and 
you'd  have  to  accommodate  your  body  to  the  impression  left  in  it 
by  the  man  that  slept  there  last,  before  you  could  lie  comfortably;  a 
carpet  that  had  seen  better  days;  a  melancholy  washstand  in  a  remote 
corner,  and  a  dejected  pitcher  on  it  sorrowing  over  a  broken  nose; 
a  looking-glass  split  across  the  center,  which  chopped  your  head  off 
at  the  chin  and  made  you  look  like  some  dreadful  unfinished  monster 
or  other ;  the  paper  peeling  in  shreds  from  the  walls. 

I  sighed  and  said :  "This  is  charming ;  and  now  don't  you  think 
3'ou  could  get  me  something  to  read?" 

The  porter  said,  "Oh,  certainly;  the  old  man's  got  dead  loads  of 
books" ;  and  he  was  gone  before  I  could  tell  him  what  sort  of  literature 
I  would  rather  have.  And  yet  his  countenance  expressed  the  utmost 
confidence  in  his  ability  to  execute  the  commission  with  credit  to 
himself.  The  old  man  made  a  descent  on  him. 

"What  are  you  going  to  do  with  that  pile  of  books?" 

"Fifteen  wants   'em,   sir." 

"Fifteen,  is  it?  He'll  want  a  warming-pan,  next — he'll  want  a  nurse! 
Take  him  everything  there  is  in  the  house — take  him  the  barkeeper — 
take  him  the  baggage-wagon — take  him  the  chambermaid !  Confound 
me,  I  never  saw  anything  like  it.  What  did  he  say  he  wants  with  those 
books  ?" 

"Wants  to  read  'em,  like  enough;  it  ain't  likely  he  wants  to  eat 
*em,  I  don't  reckon." 

"Wants  to  read  'em — wants  to  read  'em  this  time  of  night,  the 
infernal  lunatic!  Well  he  can't  have  them." 

"But  he  says  he's  mor'ly  bound  to  have  'em:  he  says  he'll  just  go 
a-rairin'  and  a-chargin'  through  this  house  and  raise  more — well,  there's 
no  tellin'  what  he  won't  do  if  he  don't  get  'em ;  because  he's  drunk  and 
crazy  and  desperate,  and  nothing'll  soothe  him  down  but  them  cussed 
books."  [I  had  not  made  any  threats  and  was  not  in  the  condition 
ascribed  to  me  by  the  porter.] 

"Well,  go  on;  but  I  will  be  around  when  he  goes  to  rairing  and 
charging,  and  the  first  rair  he  makes  I'll  make  him  rair  out  of  the 
window."  And  then  the  old  gentleman  went  off  growling  as  before. 

The  genius  of  that  porter  was  something  wonderful.  He  put  an 
armful  of  books  on  the  bed  and  said  "Good  night"  as  confidently  as 
if  he  knew  perfectly  well  that  those  books  were  exactly  my  style  of 
reading-matter.  And  well  he  might.  His  selection  covered  the  whole 
range  of  legitimate  literature.  It  comprised  The  Great  Consummation, 
by  Rev.  Dr.  Cummings — theology;  Revised  Statutes  of  the  State  of 
Missouri — law;  The  Complete  Horse-Doctor — medicine;  The  Toilers 


446  MARK  TWAIN 

of  the  Sea,  by  Victor  Hugo — romance;  the  works  of  William  Shake 
speare — poetry.  I  shall  never  cease  to  admire  the  tact  and  the  intelli 
gence  of  that  gifted  porter. 

But  all  the  donkeys  in  Christendom,  and  most  of  the  Egyp 
tian  boys,  I  think,  are  at  the  door,  and  there  is  some  noise  going 
on,  not  to  put  it  in  stronger  language.  We  are  about  starting  to 
the  illustrious  Pyramids  of  Egypt,  and  the  donkeys  for  the 
voyage  are  under  inspection.  I  will  go  and  select  one  before 
the  choice  animals  are  all  taken. 


CHAPTER  LVIII 

THE  donkeys  were  all  good,  all  handsome,  all  strong  and 
in  good  condition,  all   fast  and  all  willing  to  prove  it. 
They  were  the  best  we  had  found  anywhere,  and  the  most 
recherche.     I  do  not  know  what  recherche  is,  but  that  is  what 
these  donkeys  were,  anyhow.     Some  were  of  a  soft  mouse- 
color,  and  the  others  were  white,  black,  and  vari-colored.   Some 
were  close-shaven,  all  over,  except  that  a  tuft  like  a  paint-brush 
was  left  on  the  end  of  the  tail.     Others  were  so  shaven  in 
fanciful   landscape-garden  patterns,  as  to  mark  their   bodies 
with  curving  lines,  which  were  bounded  on  one  side  by  hair  and 
on  the  other  by  the  close  plush  left  by  the  shears.    They  had  all 
been  newly  barbered,  and  were  exceedingly  stylish.     Several 
of  the  white  ones  were  barred  like  zebras  with  rainbow  stripes 
of  blue  and  red  and  yellow  paint.     These  were  indescribably 
gorgeous.     Dan  and  Jack  selected  from  this  lot  because  they 
brought  back  Italian  reminiscences  of  the  "old  masters."    The 
saddles  were  the  high,  stuffy,  frog- shaped  things  we  had  known 
in  Ephesus  and  Smyrna.    The  donkey-boys  were  lively  young 
Egyptian  rascals  who  could  follow  a  donkey  and  keep  him  in  a 
canter  half  a  day  without  tiring.    We  had  plenty  of  spectators 
v/hen  we  mounted,  for  the  hotel  was  full  of  English  people 
bound  overland  to  India  and  officers  getting  ready  for  the  Afri 
can  campaign  against  the  Abyssinian  King  Theodorus.    We 
were  not  a  very  large  party,  but  as  we  charged  through  the 
streets  of  the  great  metropolis,  we  made  noise  for  five  hundred, 
and  displayed  activity  and  created  excitement  in  proportion. 
Nobody  can  steer  a  donkey,  and  some  collided  with  camels, 
dervishes,  effendis,  asses,  beggars,  and  everything  else  that  of 
fered  to  the  donkeys  a  reasonable  chance  for  a  collision.    When 
we  turned  into  the  broad  avenue  that  leads  out  of  the  city 
toward  Old  Cairo,  there  was  plenty  of  room.     The  walls  of 
stately  date-palms  that  fenced  the  gardens  and  bordered  the 
way,  threw  their  shadows  down  and  made  the  air  cool  and 
bracing.    We  rose  to  the  spirit  of  the  time  and  the  race  became 
a  wild  rout,  a  stampede,  a  terrific  panic.     I  wish  to  live  to 
enjoy  it  again. 

447 


448  MARK  TWAIN 

Somewhere  along  this  route  we  had  a  few  startling  exhibi 
tions  of  Oriental  simplicity.  A  girl  apparently  thirteen  years 
of  age  came  along  the  great  thoroughfare  dressed  like  Eve 
before  the  fall.  We  would  have  called  her  thirteen  at  home ; 
but  here  girls  who  look  thirteen  are  often  not  more  than  nine, 
in  reality. 

Occasionally  we  saw  stark-naked  men  of  superb  build,  bath 
ing,  and  making  no  attempt  at  concealment.  However,  an 
hour's  acquaintance  with  this  cheerful  custom  reconciled  the 
pilgrims  to  it,  and  then  it  ceased  to  occasion  remark.  Thus 
easily  do  even  the  most  startling  novelties  grow  tame  and 
spiritless  to  these  sight-surfeited  wanderers. 

Arrived  at  Old  Cairo,  the  camp-followers  took  up  the 
donkeys  and  tumbled  them  bodily  aboard  a  small  boat  with  a 
lateen  sail,  and  we  followed  and  got  under  way.  The  deck  was 
closely  packed  with  donkeys  and  men;  the  two  sailors  had  to 
climb  over  and  under  and  through  the  wedged  mass  to  work 
the  sails,  and  the  steersman  had  to  crowd  four  or  five  donkeys 
out  of  the  way  when  he  wished  to  swing  his  tiller  and  put  his 
helm  hard  down.  But  what  were  their  troubles  to  us  ?  We  had 
nothing  to  do;  nothing  to  do  but  enjoy  the  trip;  nothing  to  do 
but  shove  the  donkeys  off  our  corns  and  look  at  the  charming 
scenery  of  the  Nile. 

On  the  island  at  our  right  was  the  machine  they  call  the 
Nilometer,  a  stone  column  whose  business  it  is  to  mark  the  rise 
of  the  river  and  prophesy  whether  it  will  reach  only  thirty-two 
feet  and  produce  a  famine,  or  whether  it  will  properly  flood  the 
land  at  forty  and  produce  plenty,  or  whether  it  will  rise  to 
forty-three  and  bring  death  and  destruction  to  flocks  and  crops 
— but  how  it  does  all  this  they  could  not  explain  to  us  so  thai 
we  could  understand.  On  the  same  island  is  still  shown  thei 
spot  where  Pharaoh's  daughter  found  Moses  in  the  bulrushes. 
Near  the  spot  we  sailed  from,  the  Holy  Family  dwelt  when 
they  sojourned  in  Egypt  till  Herod  should  complete  his 
slaughter  of  the  innocents.  The  same  tree  they  rested  under 
when  they  first  arrived  was  there  a  short  time  ago,  but  the 
Viceroy  of  Egypt  sent  it  to  the  Empress  Eugenie  lately.  He 
was  Justin  time,  otherwise  our  pilgrims  would  have  had  it. 

The  Nile  at  this  point  is  muddy,  swift,  and  turbid,  and 'does 
not  lack  a  great  deal  of  bejng  as  wide  as  the  Mississippi. 

We  scrambled  up  the  steep  bank  at  the  shabby  town  of 
Ghizeh,  mounted  the  donkeys  again,  and  scampered  away.  For 
four  or  five  miles  the  route  lay  along  a  high  embankment  which 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  449 

they  say  is  to  be  the  bed  of  a  railway  the  Sultan  means  to  build 
for  no  other  reason  than  that  when  the  Empress  of  the  French 
comes  to  visit  him  she  can  go  to  the  Pyramids  in  comfort.  This 
is  true  Oriental  hospitality.  I  am  very  glad  it  is  our  privilege 
to  have  donkeys  instead  of  cars. 

At  the  distance  of  a  few  miles  the  Pyramids,  rising  above  the 
palms,  looked  very  clean-cut,  very  grand  and  imposing,  and 
very  soft  and  filmy,  as  well.  They  swam  in  a  rich  haze  that 
took  from  them  all  suggestions  of  unfeeling  stone,  and  made 
them  seem  only  the  airy  nothings  of  a  dream — structures  which 
might  blossom  into  tiers  of  vague  arches,  or  ornate  colonnades, 
maybe,  and  change  and  change  again  into  all  graceful  forms  of 
architecture  while  we  looked,  and  then  melt  deliciously  away 
and  blend  with  the  tremulous  atmosphere. 

At  the  end  of  the  levee  we  left  the  mules  and  went  in  a  sail 
boat  across  an  arm  of  the  Nile  or  an  overflow,  and  landed 
where  the  sands  of  the  Great  Sahara  left  their  embankment, 
as  straight  as  a  wall,  along  the  verge  of  the  alluvial  plain  of  the 
river.  A  laborious  walk  in  the  flaming  sun  brought  us  to  the 
foot  of  the  great  Pyramid  of  Cheops.  It  was  a  fairy  vision 
no  longer.  It  was  a  corrugated,  unsightly  mountain  of  stone. 
Each  of  its  monstrous  sides  was  a  wide  stairway  which  rose 
upward,  step  above  step,  narrowing  as  it  went,  till  it  tapered  to 
a  point  far  aloft  in  the  air.  Insect  men  and  women — pilgrims 
from  the  Quaker  City — were  creeping  about  its  dizzy  perches, 
and  one  little  black  swarm  were  waving  postage-stamps  from 
the  airy  summit — handkerchiefs  will  be  understood. 

Of  course  we  were  beseiged  by  a  rabble  of  muscular  Egyp 
tians  and  Arabs  who  wanted  the  contract  of  dragging  us  to 
the  top— all  tourists  are.  Of  course  you  could  not  hear  your 
own  voice  for  the  din  that  was  around  you.  Of  course  the 
Sheiks  said  they  were  the  only  responsible  parties;  that  all 
contracts  must  be  made  with  them,  all  moneys  paid  over  to 
them,  and  none  exacted  from  us  by  any  but  themselves  alone. 
Of  course  they  contracted  that  the  varlets  who  dragged  us  up 
should  not  mention  bucksheesh  once.  For  such  is  the  usual 
routine.  Of  course  we  contracted  with  them,  paid  them,  were 
delivered  into  the  hands  of  the  draggers,  dragged  up  the  Pyra 
mids,  and  harried  and  bedeviled  for  bucksheesh  from  the 
foundation  clear  to  the  summit.  We  paid  it,  too,  for  we  were 
purposely  spread  very  far  apart  over  the  vast  side  of  the 
Pyramid.  There  was  no  help  near  if  we  called,  and  the 
Herculeses  who  dragged  us  had  a  way  of  asking  sweetly  and 


450  MARK  TWAIN 

flatteringly  for  bucksheesh,  which  was  seductive,  and  of  looking 
fierce  and  threatening  to  throw  us  down  the  precipice,  which 
was  persuasive  and  convincing. 

Each  step  being  full  as  high  as  a  dinner-table;  there  being 
very,  very  many  of  the  steps ;  an  Arab  having  hold  of  each  of 
our  arms  and  springing  upward  from  step  to  step  and  snatch 
ing  us  with  them,  forcing  us  to  lift  our  feet  as  high  as  our 
breasts  every  time,  and  do  it  rapidly  and  keep  it  up  till  we  were 
ready  to  faint, — who  shall  say  it  is  not  lively,  exhilarating,  lace 
rating,  muscle-training,  bone-wrenching,  and  perfectly  excru 
ciating  and  exhausting  pastime,  climbing  the  Pyramids?  I 
beseeched  the  varlets  not  to  twist  all  my  joints  asunder;  I 
iterated,  reiterated,  even  swore  to  them  that  I  did  not  wish  to 
beat  anybody  to  the  top ;  did  all  I  could  to  convince  them  that  if 
I  got  there  the  last  of  all  I  would  feel  blessed  above  men  and 
them,  pleaded  with  them  to  let  me  stop  and  rest  a  moment — 
only  one  little  moment :  and  they  only  answered  with  some  more 
frightful  springs,  and  an  unenlisted  volunteer  behind  opened  a 
bombardment  of  determined  boosts  with  his  head  which 
threatened  to  batter  my  whole  political  economy  to  wreck  and 
ruin. 

Twice,  for  one  minute,  they  let  me  rest  while  they  extorted 
bucksheesh,  and  then  continued  their  maniac  flight  up  the 
Pyramid.  They  wished  to  beat  the  other  parties.  It  was 
nothing  to  them  that  I,  a  stranger,  must  be  sacrificed  upon  the 
altar  of  their  unholy  ambition.  But  in  the  midst  of  sorrow  joy 
blooms.  Even  in  this  dark  hour  I  had  a  sweet  consola 
tion.  For  I  knew  that  except  these  Mohammedans  repented 
they  would  go  straight  to  perdition  some  day.  And  they,  never 
repent — they  never  forsake  their  paganism.  This  thought 
calmed  me,  cheered  me,  and  I  sank  down,  limp  and  exhausted,  . 
upon  the  summit,  but  happy,  so  happy  and  serene  within. 

On  the  one  hand,  a  mighty  sea  of  yellow  sand  stretched 
away  toward  the  ends  of  the' earth,  solemn,  silent,  shorn  of 
vegetation,  its  solitude  uncheered  by  any  forms  of  creature 
life;  on  the  other,  the  Eden  of  Egypt  was  spread  below  us — 
a  broad  green  floor,  cloven  by  the  sinuous  river,  dotted  with 
villages,  its  vast  distances  measured  and  marked  by  the  dimin 
ishing  stature  of  receding  clusters  of  palms.  It  lay  asleep 
in  an  enchanted  atmosphere.  There  was  no  sound,  no  motion. 
Above  the  date-plumes  in  the  middle  distance,  swelled  a  domed 
and  pinnacled  mass,  glimmering  through  a  tinted,  exquisite 
mist;  away  toward  the  horizon  a  dozen  shapely  pyramids 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  451 

watched  over  ruined  Memphis ;  and  at  our  feet  the  bland  im 
passible  Sphinx  looked  out  upon  the  picture  from  her  throne 
in  the  sands  as  placidly  and  pensively  as  she  had  looked  upon 
its  like  full  fifty  lagging  centuries  ago. 

We  suffered  torture  no  pen  can  describe  from  the  hungry 
appeals  for  bucksheesh  that  gleamed  from  Arab  eyes  and 
poured  incessantly  from  Arab  lips.  Why  try  to  call  up  the 
traditions  of  vanished  Egyptian  grandeur;  why  try  to  fancy 
Egypt  following  dead  Rameses  to  his  tomb  in  the  Pyramid,  or 
the  long  multitude  of  Israel  departing  over  the  desert  yonder? 
Why  try  to  think  at  all?  The  thing  was  impossible.  One 
must  bring  his  meditations  cut  and  dried,  or  else  cut  and  dry 
them  afterward. 

The  traditional  Arab  proposed,  in  the  traditional  way,  to 
run  down  Cheops,  cross  the  eighth  of  a  mile  of  sand  intervening 
between  it  and  the  tall  pyramid  of  Cephren,  ascend  to  Ceph- 
ren's  summit  and  return  to  us  on  the  top  of  Cheops — all  in 
nine  minutes  by  the  watch,  and  the  whole  service  to  be  rendered 
for  a  single  dollar.  In  the  first  flush  of  irritation,  I  said  let  the 
Arab  and  his  exploits  go  to  the  mischief.  But  stay.  The  upper 
third  of  Cephren  was  coated  with  dressed  marble,  smooth  as 
glass.  A  blessed  thought  entered  my  brain.  He  must  infalli 
bly  break  his  neck.  Close  the  contract  with  despatch,  I  said, 
and  let  him  go.  He  started.  We  watched.  He  went  bounding 
down  the  vast  broadside,  spring  after  spring,  like  an  ibex.  He 
grew  smaller  and  smaller  till  he  became  a  bobbing  pygmy,  away 
down  toward  the  bottom — then  disappeared.  We  turned  and 
peered  over  the  other  side — forty  seconds — eighty  seconds — 
a  hundred — happiness,  he  is  dead  already? — two  minutes — and 
a  quarter — 'There  he  goes !"  Too  true — it  was  too  true.  He 
was  very  small,  now.  Gradually,  but  surely,  he  overcame  the 
level  ground.  He  began  to  spring  and  climb  again.  Up, 
Up^  Up — at  last  he  reached  the  smooth  coating — now  for  it. 
But  he  clung  to  it  with  toes  and  fingers,  like  a  fly.  He  crawled 
this  way  and  that — away  to  the  right,  slanting  upward — away 
to  the  left,  still  slanting  upward — and  stood  at  last  a  black  peg 
on  the  summit,  and  waved  his  pygmy  scarf !  Then  he  crept 
dov/nward  to  the  raw  steps  again,  then  picked  up  his  agile  heels 
and  flew.  We  lost  him  presently.  But  presently  again  we  saw 
him  under  us,  mounting  with  undiminished  energy.  Shortly  he 
bounded  into  our  midst  with  a  gallant  war-whoop.  Time, 
eight  minutes,  forty-one  seconds.  He  had  won.  His  bones 
were  intact.  It  was  a  failure.  I  reflected.  I  said  to  myself, 


452  MARK  TWAIN 

he  is  tired,  and  must  grow  dizzy.    I  will  risk  another  dollar  on 
him. 

He  started  again.  Made  the  trip  again.  Slipped  on  the 
smooth  coating — I  almost  had  him.  But  an  infamous  crevice 
saved  him.  He  was  with  us  once  more — perfectly  sound. 
Time,  eight  minutes,  forty-six  seconds. 

I  said  to  Dan,  "Lend  me  a  dollar — I  can  beat  this  game, 
yet." 

Worse  and  worse.  He  won  again.  Time,  eight  minutes, 
forty-eight  seconds.  I  was  out  of  all  patience,  now.  I  was 
desperate.  Money  was  no  longer  of  any  consequence.  I  said, 
"Sirrah,  I  will  give  you  a  hundred  dollars  to  jump  off  this 
pyramid  head  first.  If  you  do  not  like  the  terms,  name  your 
bet.  I  scorn  to  stand  on  expenses  now.  I  will  stay  right  here 
and  risk  money  on  you  as  long  as  Dan  has  got  a  cent." 

I  was  in  a  fair  way  to  win,  now,  for  it  was  a  dazzling  op 
portunity  for  an  Arab.  He  pondered  a  moment,  and  would 
have  done  it.  I  think,  but  his  mother  arrived,  then,  and  inter 
fered.  Her  tears  moved  me — I  never  can  look  upon  the  tears 
of  woman  with  indifference — and  I  said  I  would  give  her  a 
hundred  to  jump  off,  too. 

But  it  was  a  failure.  The  Arabs  are  too  high-priced  in 
Egypt.  They  put  on  airs  unbecoming  to  such  savages. 

We  descended,  hot  and  out  of  humor.  The  dragoman  lit 
candles,  and  we  all  entered  a  hole  near  the  base  of  the  pyramid, 
attended  by  a  crazy  rabble  of  Arabs  who  thrust  their  services 
upon  us  uninvited.  They  dragged  us  up  a  long  inclined  chute, 
and  dripped  candle-grease  all  over  us.  This  chute  was  not 
more  than  twice  as  wide  and  high  as  a  Saratoga  trunk,  and 
was  walled,  roofed,  and  floored  with  solid  blocks  of  Egyptian 
granite  as  wide  as  a  wardrobe,  twice  as  thick,  and  three  times  } 
as  long.  We  kept  on  climbing,  through  the  oppressive  gloom, 
till  I  thought  we  ought  to  be  nearing  the  top  of  the  pyramid 
again,  and  then  came  to  the  "Queen's  Chamber,"  and  shortly 
to  the  Chamber  of  the  King.  These  large  apartments  were 
tombs.  The  walls  were  built  of  monstrous  masses  of  smoothed 
granite,  neatly  joined  together.  Some  of  them  were  nearly 
as  large  square  as  an  ordinary  parlor.  A  great  stone  sarcopha 
gus  like  a  bathtub  stood  in  the  center  of  the  King's  Chamber. 
Around  it  were  gathered  a  picturesque  group  of  Arab  savages 
and  soiled  and  tattered  pilgrims,  who  held  their  candles  aloft 
in  the  gloom  while  they  chatted,  and  the  winking  blurs  of  light 
shed  a  dim  glory  down  upon  one  of  the  irrepressible  memento- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  453 

seekers  who  was  pecking  at  the  venerable  sarcophagus  with  his 
sacrilegious  hammer.  We  struggled  out  to  the  open-air  and  the 
bright  sunshine,  and  for  the  space  of  thirty  minutes  received 
ragged  Arabs  by  couples,  dozens,  and  platoons,  and  paid  them 
bucksheesh  for  services  they  swore  and  proved  by  each  other 
that  they  had  rendered,  but  which  we  had  not  been  aware  of 
before — and  as  each  party  was  paid,  they  dropped  into  the 
rear  of  the  procession  and  in  due  time  arrived  again  with  a 
newly  invented  delinquent  list  for  liquidation. 

We  lunched  in  the  shade  of  the  pyramid,  and  in  the  midst 
of  this  encroaching  and  unwelcome  company,  and  then  Dan  and 
Jack  and  I  started  away  for  a  walk.  A  howling  swarm  of 
beggars  followed  us — surrounded  us — almost  headed  us  off. 
A  sheik,  in  flowing  white  burnoose  and  gaudy  headgear,  was 
with  them.  He  wanted  more  bucksheesh.  But  we  had  adopted 
a  new  code — it  was  millions  for  defense,  but  not  a  cent  for 
bucksheesh.  I  asked  him  if  he  could  persuade  the  others  to 
depart  if  we  paid  him.  He  said  yes — for  ten  francs.  We 
accepted  the  contract,  and  said — 

"Now  persuade  your  vassals  to  fall  back." 

He  swung  his  long  staff  round  his  head  and  three  Arabs  bit 
the  dust.  He  capered  among  the  mob  like  a  very  maniac.  His 
blows  fell  like  hail,  and  wherever  one  fell  a  subject  went  down. 
We  had  to  hurry  to  the  rescue  and  tell  him  it  was  only  neces 
sary  to  damage  them  a  little,  he  need  not  kill  them.  In  two 
minutes  we  were  alone  with  the  sheik,  and  remained  so.  The 
persuasive  powers  of  this  illiterate  savage  were  remarkable. 

Each  side  of  the  Pyramid  of  Cheops  is  about  as  long  as  the 
Capitol  at  Washington,  or  the  Sultan's  new  palace  on  the 
Bosporus,  and  is  longer  than  the  greatest  depth  of  St.  Peter's 
at  Rome — which  is  to  say  that  each  side  of  Cheops  extends 
seven  hundred  and  some  odd  feet.  It  is  about  seventy-five  feet 
higher  than  the  cross  on  St.  Peter's.  Jhe  first  time  I  ever 
went  down  the  Mississippi,  I  thought  the  highest  bluff  on  the 
river  between  St.  Louis  and  New  Orleans — it  was  near  Selma, 
Missouri — was  probably  the  highest  mountain  in  the  world. 
It  is  four  hundred  and  thirteen  feet  high.  It  still  looms  in 
my  memory  with  undiminished  grandeur.  I  can  still  see  the 
trees  and  bushes  growing  smaller  and  smaller  as  I  followed 
them  up  its  huge  slant  with  my  eye,  till  they  became  a  feathery 
fringe  on  the  distant  summit.  This  symmetrical  Pyramid  of 
Cheops — this  solid  mountain  of  stone  reared  by  the  patient 
hands  of  men— this  mighty  tomb  of  a  forgotten  monarch— 


454  MARK  TWAIN 

dwarfs  my  cherished  mountain.  For  it  is  four  hundred  and 
eighty  feet  high.  In  still  earlier  years  than  those  I  have  been 
recalling,  Holliday's  Hill,  in  our  town,  was  to  me  the  noblest 
work  of  God.  It  appeared  to  pierce  the  skies.  It  was  nearly 
three  hundred  feet  high.  In  those  days  I  pondered  the  subject 
much,  but  I  never  could  understand  why  it  did  not  swathe 
its  summit  with  never-failing  clouds,  and  crown  its  majestic 
brow  with  everlasting  snows.  I  had  heard  that  such  was  the 
custom  of  great  mountains  in  other  parts  of  the  world.  I 
remembered  how  I  worked  with  another  boy,  at  odd  afternoons 
stolen  from  study  and  paid  for  with  stripes,  to  undermine  and 
start  from  its  bed  an  immense  boulder  that  rested  upon  the 
edge  of  that  hill-top ;  I  remembered  how,  one  Saturday  after 
noon,  we  gave  three  hours  of  honest  effort  to  the  task,  and  saw 
at  last  that  our  reward  was  at  hand ;  I  remembered  how  we 
sat  down,  then,  and  wiped  the  perspiration  away,  and  waited 
to  let  a  picnic  party  get  out  of  the  way  in  the  road  below — 
and  then  we  started  the  boulder.  It  was  splendid.  It  went 
crashing  down  the  hillside,  tearing  up  saplings,  mowing  bushes 
down  like  grass,  ripping  and  crushing  and  smashing  every 
thing  in  its  path — eternally  splintered  and  scattered  a  woodpile 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  and  then  sprang  from  the  high  bank  clear 
over  a  dray  in  the  road — the  negro  glanced  up  once  arid 
dodged — and  the  next  second  it  made  infinitesimal  mincemeat 
of  a  frame  cooper  shop,  and  the  coopers  swarmed  out  like  bees. 
Then  we  said  it  was  perfectly  magnificent,  and  left.  Because 
the  coopers  were  starting  up  the  hill  to  inquire. 

Still,  that  mountain,  prodigious  as  it  was,  was  nothing  to 
the  Pyramid  of  Cheops.    I  could  conjure  up  no  comparison  that 
would  convey  to  my  mind  a  satisfactory  comprehension  of  the 
magnitude  of  a  pile  of  monstrous  stones  that  covered  thirteen  j 
acres  of  ground  and  stretched  upward  four  hundred  and  eighty  ' 
tiresome  feet,  and  so  I  gave  it  up  and  walked  down  to  the 
Sphinx. 

After  years  of  waiting,  it  was  before  me  at  last.  The  great 
face  was  so  sad,  so  earnest,  so  longing,  so  patient.  There 
was  a  dignity  not  of  earth  in  its  mien,  and  in  its  countenance  a 
benignity  such  as  never  anything  human  wore.  It  was  stone, 
but  it  seemed  sentient.  If  ever  image  of  stone  thought,  it  was 
thinking.  It  was  looking  toward  the  verge  of  the  landscape, 
yet  looking  at  nothing — nothing  but  distance  and  vacancy.  It 
was  looking  over  and  beyond  everything  of  the  present,  and  far 
into  the  past.  It  was  gazing  out  over  the  ocean  of  Time-- 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  455 

over  lines  of  century-waves  which,  further  and  further  reced 
ing,  closed  nearer  and  nearer  together,  and  blended  at  last  into 
one  unbroken  tide,  away  toward  the  horizon  of  remote  an 
tiquity.  It  was  thinking  of  the  wars  of  departed  ages ;  of  the 
empires  it  had  seen  created  and  destroyed;  of  the  nations 
whose  birth  it  had  witnessed,  whose  progress  it  had  watched, 
whose  annihilation  it  had  noted ;  of  the  joy  and  sorrow,  the  life 
and  death,  the  grandeur  and  decay,  of  five  thousand  slow  re 
volving  years.  It  was  the  type  of  an  attribute  of  man — of  a 
faculty  of  his  heart  and  brain.  It  was  MEMORY — RETROSPEC 
TION — wrought  into  visible,  tangible  form.  All  who  know 
what  pathos  there  is  in  memories  of  days  that  are  accomplished 
and  faces  that  have  vanished — albeit  only  a  trifling  score  of 
years  gone  by — will  have  some  appreciation  of  the  pathos  that 
dwells  in  these  grave  eyes  that  look  so  steadfastly  back  upon 
the  things  they  knew  before  History  was  born — before  Tradi 
tion  had  being — things  that  were,  and  forms  that  moved,  in  a 
vague  era  which  even  Poetry  and  Romance  scarce  know  of — 
and  passed  one  by  one  away  and  left  the  stony  dreamer  solitary 
in  the  midst  of  a  strange  new  age,  and  uncomprehended  scenes. 

The  Sphinx  is  grand  in  its  loneliness ;  it  is  impossible  in  its 
magnitude;  it  is  impressive  in  the  mystery  that  hangs  over  its 
story.  And  there  is  that  in  the  overshadowing  majesty  of  this 
eternal  figure  of  stone,  with  its  accusing  memory  of  the  deeds 
of  all  ages,  which  reveals  to  one  something  of  wrhat  he  shall 
feel  when  he  shall  stand  at  last  in  the  awful  presence  of  God. 

There  are  some  things  which,  for  the  credit  of  America, 
should  be  left  unsaid,  perhaps;  but  these  very  things  happen 
sometimes  to  be  the  very  things  which,  for  the  real  benefit  of 
Americans,  ought  to  have  prominent  notice.  While  we  stood 
looking,  a  wart,  or  an  excrescence  of  some  kind,  appeared  on 
the  jaw  of  the  Sphinx.  We  heard  the  familiar  clink  of  a 
hammer,  and  understood  the  case  at  once.  One  of  our  well- 
meaning  reptiles — I  mean  relic-hunters — had  crawled  up  there 
and  was  trying  to  break  a  "Specimen"  from  the  face  of  this 
the  most  majestic  creation  the  hand  of  man  has  wrought.  But 
the  great  image  contemplated  the  dead  ages  as  calmly  as  ever, 
unconscious  of  the  small  insect  that  was  fretting  at  its  jaw. 
Egyptian  granite  that  has  defied  the  storms  and  earthquakes 
of  all  time  has  nothing  to  fear  from  the  tack-hammers  of 
ignorant  excursionists — highwaymen  like  this  specimen.  He 
failed  in  his  enterprise.  We  sent  a  sheik  to  arrest  him  if  he  had 
the  authority,  or  to  warn  him,  if  he  had  not,  that  by  the  laws 


456  MARK  TWAIN 

of  Egypt  the  crime  he  was  attempting  to  commit  was  punish 
able  with  imprisonment  or  the  bastinado.  Then  he  desisted 
and  went  away. 

The  Sphinx :  a  hundred  and  twenty-five  feet  around  the  head, 
if  I  remember  rightly — carved  out  of  one  solid  block  of  stone 
harder  than  any  iron.  The  block  must  have  been  as  large  as 
the  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel  before  the  usual  waste  (by  the  ^neces 
sities  of  sculpture)  of  a  fourth  or  a  half  of  the  original  mass 
was  begun.  I  only  set  down  these  figures  and  ^  these  remarks 
to  suggest  the  prodigious  labor  the  carving  of  it  so  elegantly, 
so  symmetrically,  so  faultlessly,  must  have  cost.  This  species 
of  stone  is  so  hard  that  figures  cut  in  it  remain  sharp  and 
unmarred  after  exposure  to  the  weather  for  two  or  three 
thousand  years.  Now  did  it  take  a  hundred  years  of  patient 
toil  to  carve  the  Sphinx?  It  seems  probable. 

Something  interfered,  and  we  did  not  visit  the  Red  Sea 
and  walk  upon  the  sands  of  Arabia.  I  shall  not  describe  the 
great  mosque  of  Mehemet  Ali,  whose  entire  inner  walls  are 
built  of  polished  and  glistening  alabaster;  I  shall  not  tell  how 
the  little  birds  have  built  their  nests  in  the  globes  of  the  great 
chandeliers  that  hang  in  the  mosque,  and  how  they  fill  the 
whole  place  with  their  music  and  are  not  afraid  of  anybody 
because  their  audacity  is  pardoned,  their  rights  are  respected, 
and  nobody  is  allowed  to  interfere  with  them,  even  though  the 
mosque  be  thus  doomed  to  go  unlighted;  I  certainly  shall  not 
tell  the  hackneyed  story  of  the  massacre  of  the  Mamelukes, 
because  I  am  glad  the  lawless  rascals  were  massacred,  and  I  do 
not  wish  to  get  up  any  sympathy  in  their  behalf ;  I  shall  not 
tell  how  that  one  solitary  Mameluke  jumped  his  horse  a  hun 
dred  feet  down  from  the  battlements  of  the  citadel  and  escaped, 
because  I  do  not  think  much  of  that — I  could  have  done  it 
myself ;  I  shall  not  tell  of  Joseph's  well  which  he  dug  in  the 
solid  rock  of  the  citadel  hill  and  which  is  still  as  good  as  new, 
nor  how  the  same  mules  he  brought  to  draw  up  the  water 
(with  an  endless  chain)  are  still  at  it  yet  and  are  getting  tired 
of  it,  too ;  I  shall  not  tell  about  Joseph's  granaries  which  he 
built  to  store  the  grain  in,  what  time  the  Egyptian  brokers  were 
"selling  short/'  unwitting  that  there  would  be  no  corn  in 
all  the  land  when  it  should  be  time  for  them  to  deliver ;  I  shall 
not  tell  anything  about  the  strange,  strange  city  of  Cairo,  be 
cause  it  is  only  a  repetition,  a  good  deal  intensified  and 
exaggerated,  of  the  Oriental  cities  I  have  already  spoken  of; 
I  shall  not  tell  of  the  Great  Caravan  which  leaves  for  Mecca 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  457 

every  year,  for  I  did  not  see  it;  nor  of  the  fashion  the  people 
have  of  prostrating  themselves  and  so  forming  a  long  human 
pavement  to  be  ridden  over  by  the  chief  of  the  expedition  on 
its  return,  to  the  end  that  their  salvation  may  be  thus  secured, 
for  I  did  not  see  that  either;  I  shall  not  speak  of  the  railway, 
for  it  is  like  any  other  railway ! — I  shall  only  say  that  the  fuel 
they  use  for  the  locomotive  is  composed  of  mummies  three 
thousand  years  old,  purchased  by  the  ton  or  by  the  graveyard 
for  that  purpose,  and  that  sometimes  one  hears  the  profane 
engineer  call  out  pettishly,  "D — n  these  plebeians,  they  don't 
burn  worth  a  cent — pass  out  a  King" ;  'I  shall  not  tell  of  the 
groups  of  mud  cones  stuck  like  wasps'  nests  upon  a  thousand 
mounds  above  high-water  mark  the  length  and  breadth  of 
Egypt — villages  of  the  lower  classes;  I  shall  not  speak  of  the 
boundless  sweep  of  level  plain,  green  with  luxuriant  grain, 
that  gladdens  the  eye  as  far  as  it  can  pierce  through  the  soft, 
rich  atmosphere  of  Egypt;  I  shall  not  speak  of  the  vision  of 
the  Pyramids  seen  at  a  distance  of  five  and  twenty  miles,  for 
the  picture  is  too  ethereal  to  be  limned  by  an  uninspired  pen; 
I  shall  not  tell  of  the  crowds  of  dusky  women  who  flocked  to 
the  cars  when  they  stopped  a  moment  at  a  station,  to  sell  us 
a  drink  of  water  or  a  ruddy,  juicy  pomegranate;  I  shall  not 
tell  of  the  motley  multitudes  and  wild  costumes  that  graced  a 
fair  we  found  in  full  blast  at  another  barbarous  station;  I 
shall  not  tell  how  we  feasted  on  fresh  dates  and  enjoyed  the 
pleasant  landscape  all  through  the  flying  journey;  nor  how  we 
thundered  into  Alexandria,  at  last,  swarmed  out  of  the  cars, 
rowed  aboard  the  ship,  left, a  comrade  behind  (who  was  to 
return  to  Europe,  thence  home),  raised  the  anchor,  and  turned 
our  bows  homeward  finally  and  forever  from  the  long  voyage ; 
nor  how,  as  the  mellow  sun  went  down  upon  the  oldest  land 
on  earth,  Jack  and  Moult  assembled  in  solemn  state  in  the 
smoking-room  and  mourned  over  the  lost  comrade  the  whole 
night  long,  and  would  not  be  comforted.  I  shall  not  speak  a 
word  of  any  of  these  things,  or  write  a  line.  They  shall  be  as 
a  sealed  book.  I  do  not  know  what  a  sealed  book  is,  because  I 
never  saw  one,  but  a  sealed  book  is  the  expression  to  use  in 
this  connection,  because  it  is  popular. 
i^tVe  were  glad  to  have  seen  the  land  which  was  the  mother  h 

1  Stated  to  me  for  a  fact.     I  only  tell  it  as  I  got  it.     I  am  willing 
to  believe  it.    I  can  believe  anything. 


458  MARK  TWAIN 

,of  civilization — which  taught  Greece  her  letters,  and  through 
Greece  Rome,  and  through  Rome  the  world ;  the  land  which 
1  could  have  humanized  and  civilized  the  hapless  children  of 
Israel,  but  allowed  them  to  depart  out  of  her  borders  little 
better  than  savages.  We  were  glad  to  have  seen  that  land 
which  had  enlightened  religion  with  future  eternal  rewards 
and  punishment  in  it,  while  even  Israel's  religion  contained  no 
promise  of  a  hereafter.  We  were  glad  to  have  seen  that  land 
which  had  glass  three  thousand  years  before  England  had  it, 
and  could  paint  upon  it  as  none  of  us  can  paint  now ;  that  land 
which  knew,  three  thousand  years  ago,  well-nigh  all  of  medicine 
and  surgery  which  science  has  discovered  lately ;  which  had  all 
those  curious  surgical  instruments  which  science  has  invented 
recently;  which  had  in  high  excellence  a  thousand  luxuries 
and  necessities  of  an  advanced  civilization  which  we  have 
gradually  contrived  and  accumulated  in  modern  times  and 
claimed  as  things  that  were  new  under  the  sun ;  that  had  paper 
untold  centuries  before  we  dreamt  of  it — and  waterfalls  before 
our  women  thought  of  them;  that  had  a  perfect  system  of 
common  schools  so  long  before  we  boasted  of  our  achievements 
in  that  direction  that  it  seems  forever  and  forever  ago.;  that 
so  embalmed  the  dead  that  flesh  was  made  almost  immortal — 
which  we  cannot  do;  that  built  temples  which  mock  at  des 
troying  time  and  smile  upon  our  lauded  little  prodigies  of 
architecture;  that  old  land  that  knew  all  which  we  know  now, 
perchance,  and  more;  that  walked  in  the  broad  highway  of 
civilization  in  the  gray  dawn  of  creation,  ages  and  ages  before 
we  were  born ;  that  left  the  impress  of  exalted,  cultivated  Mind 
upon  the  eternal  front  of  the  Sphinx  to  confound  all  scoffers 
who,  when  all  the  other  proofs  had  passed  away,  might  seek 
to  persuade  the  world  that  imperial  Egypt,  in  the  days  of  her 
high  renown,  had  groped  in  darknes^) 


CHAPTER  LIX 

WE  were  at  sea  now,  for  a  long  voyage — we  were  to 
pass  through  the  entire  length  of  the  Levant;  through 
the  entire   length  of   the  Mediterranean  proper,  also, 
and  then  cross  the  full  width  of  the  Atlantic — a  voyage  of 
several  weeks.     We  naturally  settled  down  into  a  very  slow, 
stay-at-home  manner  of   life,  and   resolved   to  be   quiet,   ex 
emplary  people,  and  roam  no  more  for  twenty  or  thirty  days. 
No  more,  at  least,  than  from  stem  to  stern  of  the  ship.    It  was 
a  very  comfortable  prospect,  though,  for  we  were  tired  and 
needed  a  long  rest. 

We  were  all  lazy  and  satisfied,  now,  as  the  meager  entries  in 
niy  note-book  (that  sure  index,  to  me,  of  my  condition)  prove. 
What  a  stupid  thing  a  note-book  gets  to  be  at  sea  anyway. 
Please  observe  the  style : 

Sunday — Services,  as  usual,  at  four  bells.  Services  at  night,  also. 
No  cards. 

Monday — Beautiful  day,  but  rained  hard.  The  cattle  purchased  at 
Alexandria  for  beef  ought  to  be  shingled.  Or  else  fattened.  The 
water  stands  in  deep  puddles  in  the  depressions  forward  of  their 
after  shoulders.  Also  here  and  there  all  over  their  backs.  It  is 
well  they  are  not  cows — it  would  soak  in  and  ruin  the  milk.  The  poor 
devil  eagle1  from  Syria  looks  miserable  and  droopy  in  the  rain  perched 
on  the  forward  capstan.  He  appears  to  have  his  own  opinion  of  a 
sea  voyage,  and  if  it  were  put  into  language  and  the  language  solidified, 
it  would  probably  essentially  dam  the  widest  river  in  the  world. 

Tuesday — Somewhere  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  island  of  Malta. 
Cannot  stop  there.  Cholera.  Weather  very  stormy.  Many  passengers 
seasick  and  invisible. 

Wednesday — Weather  still  very  savage.  Storm  blew  two  land-birds 
to  sea,  and  they  came  on  board.  A  hawk  was  blown  off,  also.  He 
circled  round  and  round  the  ship,  wanting  to  light,  but  afraid  of  the 
people.  He  was  so  tired,  though,  that  he  had  to  light,  at  last,  or 
perish.  He  stopped  in  the  foretop,  repeatedly,  and  was  as  often  blown 
away  by  the  wind.  At  last  Harry  caught  him.  Sea  full  of  flying-fish. 

*Afterward  presented  to  the  Central  Park. 
459 


460  MARK  TWAIN 

They  rise  in  flocks  of  three  hundred  and  flash  along  above  the  tops 
of  the  waves  a  distance  of  two  or  three  hundred  feet,  then  fall  and 
disappear. 

Thursday — Anchored  off  Algiers,  Africa.  Beautiful  city,  beautiful 
green  hilly  landscape  behind  it.  Stayed  half  a  day  and  left.  Not  per 
mitted  to  land,  though  we  showed  a  clean  bill  of  health.  They  were 
afraid  of  Egyptian  plague  and  cholera. 

Friday — Morning,  dominoes.  Afternoon,  dominoes.  Evening,  prom 
enading  the  decks.  Afterward,  dominoes. 

Saturday — Morning,  dominoes.  Afternoon,  dominoes.  Evening, 
promenading  the  deck.  Afterwards,  dominoes. 

Sunday — Morning  service,  four  bells.  Evening  service,  eight  bells. 
Monotony  till  midnight. — Whereupon,  dominoes. 

Monday — Morning,  dominoes.  Afternoon,  dominoes.  Evening,  prom 
enading  the  decks.  Afterward,  charades  and  a  lecture  from  Dr.  C. 
Dominoes. 

No  date — Anchored  off  the  picturesque  city  of  Cagliari,  Sardinia. 
Stayed  till  midnight,  but  not  permitted  to  land  by  these  infamous  for 
eigners.  They  smell  inodorously — they  do  not  wash — they  dare  not 
risk  cholera. 

Thursday — Anchored  off  the  beautiful  cathedral  city  of  Malaga, 
Spain. — Went  ashore  in  the  captain's  boat — not  ashore,  either,  for  they 
would  not  let  us  land.  Quarantine.  Shipped  my  newspaper  .  corre 
spondence,  which  they  took  with  tongs,  dipped  it  in  sea-water,  clipped 
it  full  of  holes,  and  then  fumigated  it  with  villainous  vapors  till  it 
smelt  like  a  Spaniard.  Inquired  about  chances  to  run  the  blockade 
and  visit  the  Alhambra  at  Granada.  Too  risky — they  might  hang  a 
body.  Set  sail — middle  of  afternoon. 

And  so  on,  and  so  on,  and  so  forth,  for  several  days.  Finally, 
anchored  off  Gibraltar,  which  looks  familiar  and  homelike. 

It  reminds  me  of  the  journal  I  opened  with  the  New  Year, 
once,  when  I  was  a  boy  and  a  confiding  and  a  willing  prey 
to  those  impossible  schemes  of  reform  which  well-meaning  old, 
maids  and  grandmothers  set  for  the  feet  of  unwary  youths 
at  that  season  of  the  year — setting  oversized  tasks  for  them, 
which,  necessarily  failing,  as  infallibly  weaken  the  boy's 
strength  of  will,  diminish  his  confidence  in  himself,  and  injure 
his  chances  of  success  in  life.  Please  accept  of  an  extract : 

Monday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Tuesday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Wednesday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Thursday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Friday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Next  Friday — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  461 

Friday  fortnight — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 
Follozving  month — Got  up,  washed,  went  to  bed. 

I  stopped,  then,  discouraged.  Startling  events  appeared  to 
be  too  rare,  in  my  career,  to  render  a  diary  necessary.  I  still 
reflect  with  pride,  however,  that  even  at  that  early  age  I 
washed  when  I  got  up.  That  journal  finished  me.  I  never 
have  had  the  nerve  to  keep  one  since.  My  loss  of  confidence 
in  myself  in  that  line  was  permanent. 

The  ship  had  to  stay  a  week  or  more  at  Gibraltar  to  take 
in  coal  for  the  home  voyage. 

((ft  would  be  very  tiresome  staying  here,  and  so  four  of  us 
ran  the  quarantine  blockade  and  spent  seven  delightful  days 
in  Seville,  Cordova,  Cadiz,  and  wandering  through  the  pleasant 
rural  scenery  of  Andalusia,  the  garden  of  Old  Spain.  The 
experiences  of  that  cheery  week  were  too  varied  and  numerous 
for  a  short  chapter,  and  I  have  not  room  for  a  long  one.  There-1 
fore  I  shall  leave  them  all  out?T 


CHAPTER  LX 

TEN  or  eleven  o'clock  found  us  coming  down  to  breakfast 
one  morning  in  Cadiz.     They  told  us  the  ship  had  been 
lying  at  anchor  in  the  harbor  two  or  three  hours.     It  was 
time  for  us  to  bestir  ourselves.     The  ship  could  wait  only  a 
little  while  because  of  the  quarantine.    We  were  soon  on  board, 
and  within  the  hour  the  white  city  and  the  pleasant  shores  of 
Spain  sank  down  behind  the  waves  and  passed  out  of  sight. 
We  had  seen  no  land  fade  from  view  so  regretfully. 

It  had  long  ago  been  decided  in  a  noisy  public  meeting  in 
the  main  cabin  that  we  could  not  go  to  Lisbon,  because  we  must 
surely  be  quarantined  there.  We  did  everything  by  mass- 
meeting,  in  the  good  old  national  way,  from  swapping  off  one 
empire  for  another  on  the  program  of  the  voyage  down  to  com 
plaining  of  the  cookery  and  the  scarcity  of  napkins.  I  am 
reminded,  now,  of  one  of  these  complaints  of  the  cookery  made 
by  a  passenger.  The  coffee  had  been  steadily  growing  more 
and  more  execrable  for  the  space  of  three  weeks,  till  at  last 
it  had  ceased  to  be  coffee  altogether  and  had  assumed  the 
nature  of  mere  discolored  water — so  this  person  said.  He  said 
it  was  so  weak  that  it  was  transparent  an  inch  in  depth  around 
the  edge  of  the  cup.  As  he  approached  the  table  one  morning 
he  saw  the  transparent  edge — by  means  of  his  extraordinary 
vision — long  before  he  got  to  his  seat.  He  went  back  and  com 
plained  in  a  high-handed  way  to  Captain  Duncan.  He  said 
the  coffee  was  disgraceful.  The  captain  showed  his.  It  seemed 
tolerably  good.  The  incipient  mutineer  was  more  outraged 
than  ever,  then,  at  what  he  denounced  as  the  partiality  shown 
the  captain's  table  over  the  other  tables  in  the  ship.  He  flour 
ished  back  and  got  his  cup  and  set  it  down  triumphantly,  and 
said: 

"Just  try  that  mixture  once,  Captain  Duncan." 
He  smelt  it — tasted  it — smiled  benignantly — then  said  : 
"It  is  inferior — for  coffee — but  it  is  pretty  fair  tea" 
The  humbled  mutineer  smelt  it,  tasted  it,  and  returned  to 
his  seat.    He  had  made  an  egregious  ass  of  himself  before  the 

462 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  463 

whole  ship.  He  did  it  no  more.  After  that  he  took  things  as 
they  came.  That  was  me. 

The  old-fashioned  ship-life  had  returned,  now  that  we  were 
no  longer  in  sight  of  land.  For  days  and  days  it  continued 
just  the  same,  one  day  being  exactly  like  another,  and,  to  me, 
every  one  of  them  pleasant.  At  last  we  anchored  in  the  open 
roadstead  of  Funchal,  in  the  beautiful  islands  we  call  the 
Madeiras. 

The  mountains  looked  surpassingly  lovely,  clad  as  they  were 
in  living  green;  ribbed  with  lava  ridges;  flecked  with  white 
cottages;  riven  by  deep  chasms  purple  with  shade;  the  great 
slopes  dashed  with  sunshine  and  mottled  with  shadows  flung 
from  the  drifting  squadrons  of  the  sky,  and  the  superb  picture 
fitly  crowned  by  towering  peaks  whose  fronts  were  swept  by 
the  trailing  fringes  of  the  clouds. 

But  we  could  not  land.  We  stayed  all  day  and  looked,  we 
abused  the  man  who  invented  quarantine,  we  held  a  dozen 
mass-meetings  and  crammed  them  full  of  interrupted  speeches, 
motions  that  fell  still-born,  amendments  that  came  to  naught, 
and  resolutions  that  died  from  sheer  exhaustion  in  trying  to  get 
before  the  house.  At  night  we  set  sail. 

We  averaged  four  mass-meetings  a  week  for  the  voyage — 
we  seemed  always  in  labor  in  this  way,  and  yet  so  often  fal 
laciously  that  whenever  at  long  intervals  we  were  safely  de 
livered  of  a  resolution,  it  was  cause  for  public  rejoicing,  and  we 
hoisted  the  flag  and  fired  a  salute. 

Days  passed — and  nights;  and  then  the  beautiful  Bermudas 
rose  out  of  the  sea,  we  entered  the  tortuous  channel,  steamed 
hither  and  thither  among  the  bright  summer  islands,  and  rested 
at  last  under  the  flag  of  England  and  were  welcome.  We  were 
not  a  nightmare  here,  where  were  civilization  and  intelligence 
in  place  of  Spanish  and  Italian  superstition,  dirt  and  dread  of 
cholera.  A  few  days  among  the  breezy  groves,  the  flower- 
gardens,  the  coral  caves,  and  the  lovely  vistas  of  blue  water  that 
went  curving  in  and  out,  disappearing  and  anon  again  appear 
ing  through  jungle  walls  of  brilliant  foliage,  restored  the 
energies  dulled  by  long  drowsing  on  the  ocean,  and  fitted  us  for 
our  final  cruise — our  little  run  of  a  thousand  miles  to  New 
York — America — HOME. 

We  bade  good-by  to  "our  friends  the  Bermudians,"  as  our 
program  hath  it — the  majority  of  those  we  were  most  intimate 
with  were  negroes — and  courted  the  great  deep  again.  I  said 
the  majority.  We  knew  more  negroes  than  white  people, 


464  MARK  TWAIN 

because  we  had  a  deal  of  washing  to  be  done,  but  we  made 
some  most  excellent  friends  among  the  whites,  whom  it  will 
be  a  pleasant  duty  to  hold  long  in  grateful  remembrance. 

We  sailed,  and  from  that  hour  all  idling  ceased.  Such 
another  system  of  overhauling,  general  littering  of  cabins  and 
packing  of  trunks  we  had  not  seen  since  we  let  go  the  anchor 
in  the  harbor  of  Beirout.  Everybody  was  busy.  Lists  of  all 
purchases  had  to  be  made  out,  and  values  attached,  to  facilitate 
matters  at  the  custom-house.  Purchases  bought  by  bulk  in 
partnership  had  to  be  equitably  divided,  outstanding  debts 
canceled,  accounts  compared,  and  trunks,  boxes,  and  packages 
labeled.  All  day  long  the  bustle  and  confusion  continued. 

And  now  came  our  first  accident.  A  passenger  was  running 
through  a  gangway,  between  decks,  one  stormy  night,  when  he 
caught  his  foot  in  the  iron  staple  of  a  door  that  had  been  heed 
lessly  left  off  a  hatchway  and  the  bones  of  his  leg  broke  at  the 
ankle.  It  was  our  first  serious  misfortune.  We  had  traveled 
much  more  than  twenty  thousand  miles,  by  land  and  sea,  in 
many  trying  climates,  without  a  single  hurt,  without  a  serious 
case  of  sickness,  and  without  a  death  among  five-and-sixty 
passengers.  Our  good  fortune  had  been  wonderful.  A  sailor 
had  jumped  overboard  at  Constantinople  one  night,  and  was 
seen  no  more,  but  it  was  suspected  that  his  object  was  to  desert, 
and  there  was  a  slim  chance,  at  least,  that  he  reached  the  shore. 
But  the  passenger-list  was  complete.  There  was  no  name  miss 
ing  from  the  register. 

At  last,  one  pleasant  morning,  we  steamed  up  the  harbor  of 
New  York,  all  on  deck,  all  dressed  in  Christian  garb— by 
special  order,  for  there  was  a  latent  disposition  in  some 
quarters  to  come  out  as  Turks — and,  amid  a  waving  of  hand 
kerchiefs  from  welcoming  friends,  the  glad  pilgrims  noted  the 
shiver  of  the  decks  that  told  that  ship  and  pier  had  joined  hands 
again,  and  the  long,  strange  cruise  was  over.  Amen. 


A  NEWSPAPER  VALEDICTORY 

IN  this  place  I  will  print  an  article  which  I  wrote  for  the 
New  York  Herald  the  night  we  arrived.  I  do  it  partly 
because  my  contract  with  my  publisher  makes  it  com 
pulsory;  partly  because  it  is  a  proper,  tolerably  accurate,  and 
exhaustive  summing-up  of  the  cruise  of  the  ship  and  the  per 
formances  of  the  pilgrims  in  foreign  lands ;  and  partly  because 
some  of  the  passengers  have  abused  me  for  writing  it,  and  I 
wish  the  public  to  see  how  thankless  a  task  it  is  to  put  one's  self 
to  trouble  to  glorify  unappreciative  people.  I  was  charged  with 
"rushing  into  print"  with  these  compliments.  I  did  not  rush. 
1  had  written  news  letters  to  the  Herald  sometimes,  but  yet 
when  I  visited  the  office  that  day  I  did  not  say  anything  about 
writing  a  valedictory.  I  did  go  to  the  Tribune  office  to  see  if 
such  an  article  was  wanted,  because  I  belonged  on  the  regular 
staff  of  that  paper  and  it  was  simply  a  duty  to  do  it.  The  man 
aging  editor  was  absent,  and  so  I  thought  no  more  about  it.  At 
night  when  the  Herald's  request  came  for  an  article,  I  did  not 
"rush."  In  fact,  I  demurred  for  a  while,  because  I  did  not 
feel  like  writing  compliments,  then,  and  therefore  was  afraid 
to  speak  of  the  cruise  lest  I  might  be  betrayed  into  using  other 
than  complimentary  language.  However,  I  reflected  that  it 
would  be  a  just  and  righteous  thing  to  go  down  and  write  a 
kind  word  for  the  Hadjis — Hadjis  are  people  who  have  made 
the  pilgrimage — because  parties  not  interested  could  not  do  it 
so  feelingly  as  I,  a  fellow-Hadji,  and  so  I  penned  the  valedic 
tory.  I  have  read  it,  and  read  it  again ;  and  if  there  is  a 
sentence  in  it  that  is  not  fulsomely  complimentary  to  captain, 
ship,  and  passengers,  7  cannot  find  it.  If  it  is  not  a  chapter 
that  any  company  might  be  proud  to  have  a  body  write  about 
them,  my  judgment  is  fit  for  nothing.  With  these  remarks  I 
confidently  submit  it  to  the  unprejudiced  judgment  of  the 
reader : 

465 


466  MARK  TWAIN 

RETURN     OF    THE    HOLY    LAND     EXCURSIONISTS— THE; 
STORY  OF  THE  CRUISE 

To  THE   EDITOR  OF  THE  HERALD: 

The  steamer  Quaker  City  has  accomplished  at  last  her  extra 
ordinary  voyage  and  returned  to  her  old  pier  at  the  foot  of  Wall 
Street.  The  expedition  was  a  success  in  some  respects,  in  some  it 
was  not.  Originally  it  was  advertised  as  a  "pleasure  excursion." 
Well,  perhaps  it  was  a  pleasure  excursion,  but  certainly  it  did  not  look 
like  one;  certainly  it  did  not  act  like  one.  Anybody's  and  every 
body's  notion  of  a  pleasure  excursion  is  that  the  parties  to  it  will  of 
a  necessity  be  young  and  giddy  and  somewhat  boisterous.  They  will 
dance  a  good  deal,  sing  a  good  deal,  make  love,  but  sermonize  very 
little.  Anybody's  and  everybody's  notion  of  a  well-conducted  funeral 
is  that  there  must  be  a  hearse  and  a  corpse,  and  chief  mourners  and 
mourners  by  courtesy,  many  old  people,  much  solemnity,  no  levity, 
and  a  prayer  and  a  sermon  withal.  Three-fourths  of  the  Quaker 
City's  passengers  were  between  forty  and  seventy  years  of  age  \ 
There  was  a  picnic  crowd  for  you !  It  may  be  supposed  that  the 
other  fourth  was  composed  of  young  girls.  But  it  was  not.  It  was 
chiefly  composed  of  rusty  old  bachelors  and  a  child  of  six  years.  Let 
us  average  the  ages  of  the  Quaker  City's  pilgrims  and  set  the  figure 
down  as  fifty  years.  Is  any  man  insane  enough  to  imagine  that  this 
picnic  of  patriarchs  sang,  made  love,  danced,  laughed,  told  anecdotes, 
dealt  in  ungodly  levity?  In  my  experience  they  sinned  little  in  these 
matters.  No  doubt  it  was  presumed  here  at  home  that  these  frolic 
some  veterans  laughed  and  sang  and  romped  all  day,  and  day  after 
day,  and  kept  up  a  noisy  excitement  from  one  end  of  the  ship  to 
the  other;  and  that  they  played  blindman's  buff  or  danced  quadrilles 
and  waltzes  on  moonlight  evenings  on  the  quarter-deck;  and  that 
at  odd  moments  of  unoccupied  time  they  jotted  a  laconic  item  or 
two  in  the  journals  they  opened  on  such  an  elaborate  plan  when  they 
left  home,  and  then  scurried  off  to  their  whist  and  euchre  labors 
under  the  cabin  lamps.  If  these  things  were  presumed,  the  presumption 
was  at  fault.  The  venerable  excursionists  were  not  gay  and  frisky. 
They  played  no  blindman's  buff;  they  dealt  not  in  whist;  they  shirked 
not  the  irksome  journal,  for  alas !  most  of  them  were  even  writing 
books.  They  never  romped,  they  talked  but  little,  they  never  sang, 
save  in  the  nightly  prayer-meeting.  The  pleasure  ship  was  a  syna 
gogue,  and  the  pleasure  trip  was  a  funeral  excursion  without  a  corpse. 
(There  is  nothing  exhilarating  about  a  funeral  excursion  without  a 
corpse).  A  free,  hearty  laugh  was  a  sound  that  was  not  heard 
oftener  than  once  in  seven  days  about  those  decks  or  in  those  cabins, 
and  when  it  was  heard  it  met  with  precious  little  sympathy.  The 
excursionists  danced  on  three -separate  evenings,  long,  long  ago  (it 
seems  an  age)  quadrilles,  of  a  single  set,  made  up  of  three  ladies  and 
five  ^  gentlemen  (the  latter  with  handkerchiefs  around  their  arms  to 
signify  their  sex),  who  timed  their  feet  to  the  solemn  wheezing  of  a 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  467 

melodeon;  but  even  this  melancholy  orgie  was  voted  to  be  sinful,  and 
dancing  was  discontinued. 

The  pilgrims  played  dominoes  when  too  much  Josephus  or  Robinson's 
Holy  Land  Researches,  or  book-writing,  made  recreation  necessary 
for  dominoes  is  about  as  mild  and  sinless  a  game  as  any  in  the 
world,  perhaps,  excepting  always  the  ineffably  insipid  diversion  they 
call  croquet,  which  is  a  game  where  you  don't  pocket  any  balls  and 
don't  carom  on  any  thing  of  any  consequence,  and  when  you  are  done 
nobody  has  to  pay,  and  there  are  no  refreshments  to  saw  off,  and, 
consequently,  there  isn't  any  satisfaction  whatever  about  it — they  played 
dominoes  till  they  were  rested,  and  then  they  blackguarded  each  other 
privately  till  prayer-time.  When  they  were  not  seasick  they  were 
uncommonly  prompt  when  the  dinner-gong  sounded.  Such  was  our 
daily  life  on  board  the  ship — solemnity,  decorum,  dinner,  dominoes, 
devotions,  slander.  It  was  not  lively  enough  for  a  pleasure  trip;  but 
if  we  had  only  had  a  corpse  it  would  have  made  a  noble  funeral 
excursion.  It  is  all  over  now;  but  when  I  look  back,  the  idea  of 
these  venerable  fossils  skipping  forth  on  a  six-months  picnic  seems 
exquisitely  refreshing.  The  advertised  title  of  the  expedition — "The 
Grand  Holy  Land  Pleasure  Excursion" — was  a  misnomer.  "The  Grand 
Holy  Land  Funeral  Procession"  would  have  been  better — much  better. 

Wherever  we  went,  in  Europe,  Asia,  or  Africa,  we  made  a  sen 
sation,  and,  I  suppose  I  may  add,  created  a  famine.  None  of  us 
had  ever  been  anywhere  before;  we  all  hailed  from  the  interior;  travel 
was  a  wild  novelty  to  us,  and  we  conducted  ourselves  in  accordance 
with  the  natural  instincts  that  were  in  us,  and  trammeled  ourselves 
with  no  ceremonies,  no  conventionalities.  (We  always  took  care  to  , 
make  it  understood  that  we  were  Americans — Americans !  When  we  j 
found  that  a  good  many  foreigners  had  hardly  ever  heard  of  America, 
and  that  a  good  many  more  knew  it  only  as  a  barbarous  province  ] 
away  off  somewhere,  that  had  lately  been  at  war  with  somebody,  we 
pitied  the  ignorance  of  the  Old  World,  but  abated  no  jot  of  our  im 
portance.  Many  and  many  a  simple  community  in  the  Eastern  hemi 
sphere  will  remember  for  years  the  incursion  of  the  strange  horde 
in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1867,  that  called  themselves  Americans,  and 
seemed  to  imagine  in  some  unaccountable  way  that  they  had  a  right  to 
be  proud  of  it.  ^  We  generally  created  a  famine,  partly  because  the 
coffee  on  the  Quaker  City  was  unendurable,  and  sometimes  the  more 
substantial  fare  was  not  strictly  first  class ;  and  partly  because  one 
naturally  tires  of  sitting  long  at  the  same  board  and  eating  from  the 
same  dishes. 

;The  people  of  those  foreign  countries  are  very,  very  ignorant.  They 
looked  curiously  at  the  costumes  we  had  brought  from  the  wilds  of 
America.  They  observed  that  we  talked  loudly  at  table  sometimes. 
They  noticed  that  we  looked  out  for  expenses,  and  got  what  we  con-  ' 
veniently  could  out  of  a  franc,  and  wondered  where  in  the  mischief  we 
came  from.  In  Paris  they  just  simply  opened  their  eyes  and  stared 
when  we  spoke  to  them  in  French!  We  never  did  succeed  in  making 


468  MARK  TWAIN 

.those  idiots  understand  their  own  language.  One  of  our  passengers 
said  to  a  shopkeeper,  in  reference  to  a  proposed  return  to  buy  a 
pair  of  gloves,  "Allong  rcstray  tranked — maybe  vc  coom  Moonday"  ; 
and  would  you  believe  it,  that  shopkeeper,  a  born  Frenchman,  had  to 
ask  what  it  was  that  had  been  said.  Sometimes  it  seems  to  me, 
somehow,  that  there  must  be  a  difference  between  Parisian  French  and 
Quaker  City  French./ 

The  people  starecf  at  us  everywhere,  and  we  stared  at  them.  We 
\  generally  made  them  feel  rather  small,  too,  before  we  got  done  with 
them,  because  we  bore  down  on  them  with  America's  greatness  until 
we  crushed  them.  And  yet  we  took  kindly  to  the  manners  and  cus 
toms,  and  especially  to  the  fashions  of  the  various  people  we  visited. 
When  we  left  the  Azores,  we  wore  awful  capotes  and  used  fine-tooth 
combs — successfully.  When  we  came  back  from  Tangier,  in  Africa, 
we  were  topped  with  fezzes  of  the  bloodiest  hue,  hung  with  tassels 
like  an  Indian's  scalp-lock.  In  France  and  Spain  we  attracted  some 
attention  in  these  costumes.  In  Italy  they  naturally  took  us  for 
distempered  Garibaldians,  and  set  a  gunboat  to  look  for  anything 
significant  in  our  changes  of  uniform.  We  made  Rome  howl.  We 
could  have  made  any  place  howl  when  we  had  all  our  clothes  on.  We 
got  no  fresh  raiment  in  Greece — they  had  but  little  there  of  any  kind. 
But  at  Constantinople,  how  we  turned  out!  Turbans,  simitars,  fezzes, 
horse-pistols,  tunics,  sashes,  baggy  trousers,  yellow  slippers — Oh,  we 
were  gorgeous !  The  illustrious  dogs  of  Constantinople  barked  their 
under-jaws  off,  and  even  then  failed  to  do  us  justice.  They  are 
all  dead  by  this  time.  They  could  not  go  through  such  a  run  of  busi 
ness  as  we  gave  them  and  survive. 

And  then  we  went  to  see  the  Emperor  of  Russia.  We  just  called 
on  him  as  comfortably  as  if  we  had  known  him  a  century  or  so,  and 
when  we  had  finished  our  visit  we  variegated  ourselves  with  selections 
from  Russian  costumes  and  sailed  away  again  more  picturesque  than 
ever.  In  Smyrna  we  picked  up  camel's-hair  shawls  and  other  dressy 
things  from  Persia;  but  in  Palestine — ah,  in  Palestine — our  splendid 
career  ended.  They  didn't  wear  any  clothes  to  speak  of.  We  were 
satisfied,  and  stopped.  We  made  no  experiments.  We  did  not  try  their 
costume.  But  we  astonished  the  natives  of  that  country.  We  aston 
ished  them  with  such  eccentricities  of  dress  as  we  could  muster.  We 
prowled  through  the  Holy  Land,  from  Cesarea  Philippi  to  Jerusalem 
and  the  Dead  Sea,  a  weird  procession  of  pilgrims,  gotten  up  regard 
less  of  expense,  solemn,  gorgeous,  green-spectacled,  drowsing  under 
blue  umbrellas,  and  astride  of  a  sorrier  lot  of  horses,  camels,  and 
asses  than  those  that  came  out  of  Noah's  ark,  after  eleven  months 
of  seasickness  and  short  rations.  If  ever  those  children  of  Israel  in 
Palestine  forget  when  Gideon's  Band  went  through  there  from  Amer 
ica,  they  ought  to  be  cursed  once  more  and  finished.  It  was  the  rarest 
spectacle  that  ever  astounded  mortal  eyes,  perhaps. 

QSfell,  we  were  at  home  in  Palestine.  It  was  easy  to  see  that  that  was 
U  the  grand  feature  of  the  expedition.  We  had  cared  nothing  much  about 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  469 

Europe.  We  galloped  through  the  Louvre,  the  Pitti,  the  Uffizzi,  the 
Vatican — all  the  galleries — and  through  the  pictured  and  frescoed 
churches  of  Venice,  Naples,  and  the  cathedrals  of  Spain;  some  of  us 
said  that  certain  of  the  great  works  of  the  old  masters  were  glorious 
creations  of  genius  (we  found  it  out  in  the  guide-book,  though  we  got 
hold  of  the  wrong  picture  sometimes),  and  the  others  said  they  were 
disgraceful  old  daubs.  We  examined  modern  and  ancient  statuary  with 
a  critical  eye  in  Florence,  Rome,  or  anywhere  we  found  it,  and  praised 
it  if  we  saw  fit,  and  if  he  didn't  we  said  we  preferred  the  wooden  In 
dians  in  front  of  the  cigar  stores  of  America.  But  the  Holy  Land 
brought  out  all  our  enthusiasm.  We  fell  into  raptures  by  the  barren 
shores  of  Galilee ;  we  pondered  at  Tabor  and  at  Nazareth ;  we  exploded 
into  poetry  over  the  questionable  loveliness  of  Esdraelon;  we  meditated 
at  Jezreel  and  Samaria  over  the  missionary  zeal  of  Jehu;  we  rioted — 
fairly  rioted  among  the  holy  places  of  Jerusalem;  we  bathed  in 
Jordan  and  the  Dead  Sea,  reckless  whether  our  accident-insurance 
policies  were  extra-hazardous  or  not,  and  brought  away  so  many  jugs 
.of  precious  water  from  both  places  that  all  the  country  from  Jericho 
to  the  mountains  of  Moab  will  suffer  from  drought  this  year,  I  think. 
Yet,  the  pilgrimage  part  of  the  excursion  was  its  pet  feature — there 
is  no  question  about  that.  After  dismal,  smileless  Palestine,  beautiful 
Egypt  had  few  charms  for  us.  We  merely  glanced  at  it  and  were  ready 
for  home.) 

They  wouldn't  let  us  land  at  Malta — quarantine;  they  would  not 
let  us  land  in  Sardinia ;  nor  at  Algiers,  Africa,  nor  at  Malaga,  Spain,  nor 
Cadiz,  nor  at  the  Madeira  Islands.  So  we  got  offended  at  all  for 
eigners  and  turned  our  backs  upon  them  and  came  home.  I  sup 
pose  we  only  stopped  at  the  Bermudas  because  they  were  in  the 
program.  We  did  not  care  anything  about  any  place  at  all.  We  wanted 
to  go  home.  Homesickness  was  abroad  in  the  ship — it  was  epidemic. 
If  the  authorities  of  New  York  had  known  how  badly  we  had  it,  they 
would  have  quarantined  us  here. 

The  grand  pilgrimage  is  over.  Good-bye  to  it,  and  a  pleasant 
memory  to  it,  I  am  able  to  say  in  all  kindness.  I  bear  no  malice, 
no  ill  will  toward  any  individual  that  was  connected  with  it,  either 
as  passenger  or  officer.  Things  I  did  not  like  at  all  yesterday  I  like 
very  well  to-day,  now  that  I  am  home,  and  always  hereafter  I  shall 
be  able  to  poke  fun  at  the  whole  gang  if  the  spirit  so  moves  me  to 
do,  without  ever  saying  a  malicious  word.  The  expedition  accom 
plished  all  that  its  program  promised  that  it  should  accomplish,  and 
we  ought  all  to  be  satisfied  with  the  management  of  the  matter, 
certainly.  By-by ! 

MARK   TWAIN. 

I  call  that  complimentary.     It  is  complimentary  and  yet  I 
never  have  received  a  word  of  thanks  for  it  from  the  Hadjis ; 


470  MARK  TWAIN 

on  the  contrary,  I  speak  nothing  but  the  serious  truth  when 
I  say  that  many  of  them  even  took  exceptions  to  the  article. 
In  endeavoring  to  please  them  I  slaved  over  that  sketch  for  two 
hours,  and  had  my  labor  for  my  pains.  I  never  will  do  a 
generous  deed  again. 

CONCLUSION 

NEARLY  one  year  has  flown  since  this  noble  pilgrimage 
was  ended ;  and  as  I  sit  here  at  home  in  San  Francisco 
thinking,  I  am  moved  to  confess  that  day  by  day  the 
mass  of  my  memories  of  the  excursion  have  grown  more  and 
more  pleasant  as  the  disagreeable  incidents  of  travel  which 
encumbered  them  flitted  one  by  one  out  of  my  mind — and  now, 
if  the  Quaker  City  were  weighing  her  anchor  to  sail  away 
on  the  very  same  cruise  again,  nothing  could  gratify  me  more 
than  to  be  a  passenger.  With  the  same  captain  and  even  the 
same  pilgrims,  the  same  sinners.  I  was  on  excellent  terms  with 
eight  or  nine  of  the  excursionists  (they  are  my  stanch  friends 
yet),  and  was  even  on  speaking  terms  with  the  rest  of  the 
sixty-five.  I  have  been  at  sea  quite  enough  to  know  that  that 
was  a  very  good  average.  Because  a  long  sea-voyage  not  only 
brings  out  all  the  mean  traits  one  has,  and  exaggerates  them, 
but  raises  up  others  which  he  never  suspected  he  possessed, 
and  even  creates  new  ones.  A  twelve  months'  voyage  at  sea 
would  make  an  ordinary  man  a  very  miracle  of  meanness.  On 
the  other  hand,  if  a  man  has  good  qualities,  the  spirit  seldom 
moves  him  to  exhibit  them  on  shipboard,  at  least  with  any  sort 
of  emphasis.  Now  I  am  satisfied  that  our  pilgrims  are  pleasant 
old  people  on  shore ;  I  am  also  satisfied  that  at  sea  on  a  second 
voyage  they  would  be  pleasanter,  somewhat,  than  they  were  on 
our  grand  excursion,  and  so  I  say  without  hesitation  that  I 
would  be  glad  enough  to  sail  with  them  again.  I  could  at  least 
enjoy  life  with  my  handful  of  old  friends.  They  could  enjoy 
life  with  their  cliques  as  well — passengers  invariably  divide  up 
into  cliques,  on  all  ships. 

And  I  will  say,  here,  that  I  would  rather  travel  with  an 
excursion  party  of  Methuselahs  than  have  to  be  changing  ships 
and  comrades  constantly,  as  people  do  who  travel  in  the  ordi 
nary  way.  Those  latter  are  always  grieving  over  some  other 
ship  they  have  known  and  lost,  and  over  other  comrades  whom 
diverging  routes  have  separated  from  them.  They  learn  to 
love  a  ship  just  in  time  to  change  it  for  another,  and  they  be 
come  attached  to  a  pleasant  traveling-companion  only  to  lose 


INNOCENTS  ABROAD  471 

him.  They  have  that  most  dismal  experience  of  being  in  a 
strange  vessel,  among  strange  people  who  care  nothing  about 
them,  and  of  undergoing  the  customary  bullying  by  strange 
officers  and  the  insolence  of  strange  servants,  repeated  over  and 
over  again  within  the  compass  of  every  month.  They  have 
also  that  other  misery  of  packing  and  unpacking  trunks — of 
running  the  distressing  gauntlet  of  custom-houses — of  the 
anxieties  attendant  upon  getting  a  mass  of  baggage  from  point 
to  point  on  land  in  safety.  I  had  rather  sail  with  a  whole 
brigade  of  patriarchs  than  suffer  so.  We  never  packed  our 
trunks  but  twice — when  we  sailed  from  New  York,  and  when 
we  returned  to  it.  Whenever  we  made  a  land  journey,  we 
estimated  how  many  days  we  should  be  gone  and  what  amount 
of  clothing  we  should  need,  figured  it  down  to  a  mathematical 
nicety,  packed  a  valise  or  two  accordingly,  and  left  the  trunks 
on  board.  We  chose  our  comrades  from  among  our  old,  tried 
friends,  and  started.  We  were  never  dependent  upon  strangers 
for  companionship.  We  often  had  occasion  to  pity  Americans 
whom  we  found  traveling  drearily  among  strangers  with  no 
friends  to  exchange  pains  and  pleasures  with.  Whenever  we 
were  coming  back  from  a  land  journey,  our  eyes  sought  one 
thing  in  the  distance  first — the  ship — and  when  we  saw  it 
riding  at  anchor  with  the  flag  apeak,  we  felt  as  a  returning 
wanderer  feels  when  he  sees  his  home.  When  we  stepped  on 
board,  our  cares  vanished,  our  troubles  were  at  an  end — for 
the  ship  was  home  to  us.  We  always  had  the  same  familiar 
old  stateroom  to  go  to,  and  feel  safe  and  at  peace  and  comfort 
able  again. 

I  have  no  fault  to  find  with  the  manner  in  which  our  ex 
cursion  was  conducted.  Its  program  was  faithfully  carried 
out — a  thing  which  surprised  me,  for  great  enterprises  usually 
promise  vastly  more  than  they  perform.  It  would  be  well 
if  such  an  excursion  could  be  gotten  up  every  year  and  the 
system  regularly  inaugurated.  ^Travel  is  fatal  to  prejudice, 
bigotry,  arid  narrow-mindedness,  and  many  of  our  people  need 
it  sorely  on  these  accounts.  Broad,  wholesome,  charitable 
views  of  men  and  things  cannot  be  acquired  by  vegetating  in 
one  little  corner  of  the  earth  all  one's  lif  crimed 

The  excursion  is  ended,  and  has  passed  to  its  place  among 
the  things  that  were.  But  its  varied  scenes  and  its  manifold 
incidents  will  linger  pleasantly  in  our  memories  for  many  a 
year  to  come.  Always  on  the  wing,  as  we  were,  and  merely 
pausing  a  moment  to  catch  fitful  glimpses  of  the  wonders  of 


4/2  MARK  TWAIN 

half  a  world,  we  could  not  hope  to  receive  or  retain  vivid  im 
pressions  of  all  it  was  our  fortune  to  see.  Yet  our  holidaj: 
flight  has  not  been  in  vain — for  above  the  confusion  of  vaguf 
recollections,  certain  of  its  best  prized  pictures  lift  themselvel 
and  will  still  continue  perfect  in  tint  and  outline  after  their  sur-j 
roundings  shall  have  faded  away. 

•We  shall  remember  something  of  pleasant  France ;  and  sorne-j 
thing  also  of  Paris,  though  it  flashed  upon  us  a  splendid  meteon 
and  was  gone  again,  we  hardly  knew  how  or  where.  W<| 
shall  remember,  always,  how  we  saw  majestic  Gibraltar  glori«j 
fied  with  the  rich  coloring  of  a  Spanish  sunset  and  swimming 
in  a  sea  of  rainbows.  In  fancy  we  shall  see  Milan  again,  anc^ 
her  stately  cathedral  with  its  marble  wilderness  of  graceful 
spires.  And  Padua — Verona — Como,  jeweled  with  stars;  and 
patrician  Venice,  afloat  on  her  stagnant  flood — silent,  desolate! 
naughty — scornful  of  her  humbled  state — wrapping  herself  iij 
memories  of  her  lost  fleets,  of  battle  and  triumph,  and  all  th«j 
pageantry  of  a  glory  that  is  departed. 

We  cannot  forget  Florence — Naples — nor  the  foretaste  o! 
heaven  that  is  in  the  delicious  atmosphere  of  Greece — an<! 
surely  not  Athens  and  the  broken  temples  of  the  AcropoHsj 
Surely  not  venerable  Rome — nor  the  green  plain  that  com! 
passes  her  round  about,  contrasting  its  brightness  with  hej 
gray  decay — nor  the  ruined  arches  that  stand  apart  in  the  plan; 
and  clothe  their  looped  and  windowed  raggedness  with  vines; 
We  shall  remember  St.  Peter's;  not  as  one  seer,  it  when  iij 
walks  the  streets  of  Rome  and  fancies  all  her  domes  are  jus} 
alike,  but  as  he  sees  it  leagues  away,  when  every  meaner  edificj 
has  faded  out  of  sight  and  that  one  dome  looms  superbly  iv 
in  the  flush  of  sunset,  full  of  dignity  and  grace,  strongly  out; 
lined  as  a  mountain. 

We  shall  remember  Constantinople  and  the  Bosporus— thi 
colossal  magnificence  of  Baalbec — the  Pyramids  of  Egypt— 
the  prodigious  form,  the  benignant  countenance  of  the  Sphin:; 
— Oriental  Smyrna — sacred  Jerusalem — Damascus,  the  "Pear: 
of  the  East,"  the  pride  of  Syria,  the  fabled  Garden  of  Eden 
the  home  of  princes  and  genii  of  the  Arabian  Nights,  the  oldesi 
metropolis  on  earth,  the  one  city  in  all  the  world  that  has  kej: 
its  name  and  held  its  place  and  looked  serenely -on  while +th: 
Kingdoms  and  Empires  of  four  thousand  years  have  rise;; 
to  life,  enjoyed  their  little  season  of  pride  and  pomp,  and  the ' 
vanished  and  been  forgotten! 

THE   END 

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